The line graph illustrates the number of students graduating from primary, secondary, and tertiary educational levels in a European town between 1985 and 2015.
Overall, the number of primary and secondary graduates fluctuated significantly over the 30-year period, while the number of tertiary graduates generally declined. Primary education saw the highest number of graduates in most years, whereas tertiary graduation figures remained the lowest throughout.
In 1985, around 7,000 students graduated from primary school, which was the lowest among the three categories. However, this figure rose sharply and peaked at approximately 17,000 in 1995. After a slight decline, it remained relatively high, reaching around 15,000 again by 2015. Secondary graduates started at about 10,000 in 1985, rose steadily to 14,000 in 1990, and then fluctuated before peaking at nearly 16,000 in 2010. By 2015, however, this number dropped dramatically to around 7,000, making it the lowest among the three levels in that year.
Tertiary graduates began at approximately 11,000 in 1985, but this number dropped steadily to a low of about 5,000 by 1995. Although there was a recovery over the next decade, reaching around 9,000 in 2005, the trend declined again toward the end of the period, with numbers falling back to 6,000 in 2015.
This overall downward trend in tertiary education may reflect limited access to higher education or changing priorities in the local job market, despite Europe’s broader efforts – such as the Bologna Process – to improve higher education access and quality during this time.