Otago Region

School Qualifications: NCEA Level 3

A formal school qualification is a measure of the extent to which young adults have completed a basic prerequisite for higher education and training, and many entry-level jobs.

School leavers are identified from the Ministry of Education's ENROL system, while highest school qualification is obtained from schools and the New Zealand Qualifications Authority. Data presented here is for school leavers with NCEA Level 1 and above, level 2 and above and level 3 and above (including a UE Award).

Identical information is available for the region's territorial authorities using the drop down menu above. For other territorial authorities first choose the appropriate region from the drop down menu above. Alternatively a large amount of school leaver data is available from our statistical pages. See School Leavers.

School leavers with at least NCEA level 3 or equivalent by gender and ethnic group (2022-2024)
Group Below NCEA level 3 NCEA level 3 or above Percentage with NCEA level 3 or above
2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024 2022 2023 2024
Female 408 396 444 825 817 918 66.9 67.4 67.4
Male 658 667 596 714 627 784 52.0 48.5 56.8
Māori 229 215 222 183 172 215 44.4 44.4 49.2
Pacific 79 65 80 69 65 76 46.6 50.0 48.7
Asian 27 54 48 146 134 189 84.4 71.3 79.7
MELAA 22 26 32 29 34 42 56.9 56.7 56.8
Other 8 11 9 18 15 25 69.2 57.7 73.5
European/Pākehā 850 843 830 1,264 1,202 1,389 59.8 58.8 62.6
Regional Total 1,066 1,063 1,040 1,539 1,444 1,702 59.1 57.6 62.1
New Zealand Total 30,204 30,328 30,014 34,019 33,975 37,397 53.0 52.8 55.5

Notes:

  1. ‘x’ = data has been suppressed where there are between 0 and 5 students in the denominator for a specific group, for example Asian students. Where one gender has been suppressed the corresponding gender has also been suppressed. 'na' = not applicable.
  2. Ethnicity is multiple response, that is, students who affiliated in more than one ethnic group have been counted in each ethnic group. Students are only counted once in the total, therefore, the ethnic groups may not sum to the total.
  3. International fee-paying students and adult students (age 19+) are excluded.