Press release 23/03/2009

UNIVERSITY STATISTICS – University Access Exam (PAU) 2007/08 Academic year

The average score for Basque students was close to a B in the 2008 University Access Exam

55% of the students took the exam in Basque

9,163 young people registered to take the University Access Exam in the Basque Country in 2008, according to Eustat data. A total of 8,588 passed the exam (94%), with an average pass mark of 6.7, close to a "B". Furthermore, 55% of the students took the exam in Basque.

7,557 students registered for the June exam session and 97% of them passed, while 1,632 registered for the July session and 78% passed.

Compared to the results of the other Autonomous Communities, the Basque Country (94%) was in third place in terms of the pass rate, close behind the Comunidad Valenciana and Extremadura, both with 95%, and eight points above the average for Spain.

Graph 1.- Pass Rates by Autonomous Communities (%)

Source: Eustat and Spanish National Statistics Office (INE)



Students from private centres and those studying model D obtained the best results

With respect to the ownership of the centre, 4,952 candidates from private centres took the exam, with 4,699 students (95%) passing, while 4,211 students were from public centres, 3,889 (92%) of whom passed the university entrance exam.

In terms of selected options, nearly all the students (9,139) registered for one single option, compared to 24 students who chose combined options, in other words, they took the exam in more than one option, as they had opted to study some subject or subjects linked to other options.

Therefore, among the upper secondary options, the passes ranged between 92.7% in the humanities and 95.6% in the arts option, and, on the other hand, the average mark ranged between a 6.3 in arts and a 6.9 in health sciences.

On the other hand, there were no significant differences between the results according to the linguistic model in which they had studied, even though there was a higher pass rate in Model D (94.4%) than in Model A (92.9%).

Higher pass rate again among women

In 2008, 5278 women, i.e. 58% of the total, took the University Access Exam. 95% of them passed, which was three percentage points higher than the men (92%), which continued the trend noted over the last seven years.

Table 1.- Students registered and passes per exam session. 2008

Source: EUSTAT

For further information:

Euskal Estatistika-Erakundea / Instituto Vasco de Estadística C/ Donostia-San Sebastián, 1 01010 Vitoria-Gasteiz Tlf:+34-945-01 75 00 Fax:+34-945-01 75 01 E-mail: eustat@eustat.es Contact: Maite Ugarte Barcina Tlf:+34-945-01 75 47 Fax:+34-945-01 75 01 Online press releases: www.eustat.es Databank: www.eustat.eus/bancopx/english/indice.aspx