Total of 87,190 foreign students learning English in Malta in 2017

A total of 87,190 foreign students attended English Language courses at local licensed English language Teaching schools in 2017, increasing by 13.6% over 2016.

Statistics published by the NSO reveals that foreign students enrolled in local licensed ELT schools spent a total of 244,202 weeks in Malta in 2017.

The majority of students attending English courses in Malta came from Italy, Germany and France, which together accounted for more than half of total students. The minority of students came from Sweden, with a total of 630 students.

The largest share of students were aged 15 or less, making up 32.2% of students. On the other hand, students aged 50 or over were in the minority, at 5,741 students.

Female students outnumbered males in all age categories, and accounted for 59.7% of the entire student population.

July was the busiest month for local licensed ELT schools with 21,567 arrivals -24.7% of the annual total. This was followed by August and March with 10.8 and 10.0% of total arrivals respectively. December was the most quiet time of the year, with a total of 949 students.

The share of foreign students attending English language courses in 2017 when compared to total inbound tourists for the same year, stood at 3.8%. Of this share, 3% were males and 4.7% were females.

The average length of stay during the year under review stood at 2.8 weeks, down by 0.2 weeks when compared to 2016. With an average of 12.2 weeks, students from Colombia recorded the highest average duration.

These were followed by South Korean and Turkish students with an average duration of 9.3 and 7.2 weeks respectively.

In 2017, teaching staff in local licensed ELT schools amounted to 1,225. The largest share of teaching staff was aged between 18 and 24. Female teachers accounted for 71.4% of the total teaching staff. Non-teaching staff amounted to 759, of which 56.3% were employed on a full-time basis.