Immigrant children make up 9.4 pct of Italy school population: report

ROME, March 29 (Xinhua) -- Immigrant children make up 9.4 percent of Italy's total school population, and 61 percent of them were born in Italy of foreign parents, the Education Ministry said in a report out Thursday.

In 2016-2017, there were 826,000 foreign students enrolled in Italy's kindergartens, middle schools and high schools, up by 11,000 pupils compared to the previous academic year, the report said.

Of these, 61 percent were second-generation immigrants, up by 24,000 students or 5.1 percent in the past year and 35.4 percent over the past five years.

The top represented countries were Romania (19.2 percent), followed by Albania (13.6 percent) and Morocco (12.4 percent).

The wealthy northern Lombardy region, where the city of Milan is located, had the most non-Italian students (about 208,000), the Education Ministry said. Enditem