Activity Agreements National Implementation 2011-12

Characteristics of leavers from Activity Agreements

3 The following section provides some narrative on the characteristics of leavers from the first full year of the national programme. Please be aware that some variables have up to 50% missing data on some key variables. The figures are shown in more detail in Annex 2 (tables 1 - 12).

• Age - the majority of young people in the sample (76.5%) are aged 16-17.
• Gender - Slightly more leavers are male (55%) than female (45%).
• Qualifications - almost half of leavers (49%) have no qualifications at all. A further 40% of leavers have qualifications between SCQF Levels 1 and 4. Within the adult population (age 25+), those with qualifications at or below SCQF level 4 are identified as being "low skilled". ^[2] Only 2.7% of the sample have qualifications at intermediate level or above (SCQF 5 +).
• Additional Support Needs - around half of leavers have some form of additional support needs (47.1%) and that by far the main issue reported is social, emotional or behavioural difficulties (20% of all leavers).
• 'Looked After' and Care Leavers - the data shows that 7.7% of leavers were reported as being Looked After and 10% were Care Leavers.
• History of Offending - 16.5% of leavers from this cohort had some reported history of offending.
• Drug / Alcohol Problems - 13.5% of leavers were reported as having drug or alcohol problems.
• Young Carers - Very small numbers of young people reported any caring responsibilities, whether as a parent (under 1 %) or in relation to another/relative (4.7%).