The national Gross Enrolment Ratio has remained in the eighties over the 1990-1995 period. There is not much difference between the GER and NER for these years either (Table 5). The date on urban and rural school-age population was not available.

However, the figures for the 1990 and 1995 urban and rural primary school enrolment indicate a drift of rural children towards the urban centers, mainly Tarawa. The percentage of total national enrolment in the urban centers increased from 22 to 37 between 1990 and 1995 while the rural enrolment decreased from 78 to 63 percentage. The urban schools continue to attract children from the rural areas, as parents in the rural areas generally perceive urban schools to be best. This contributes to overcrowding in urban classes and multi class teaching in rural schools.

Girls are fairly well represented in primary schools, making about 50% of primary enrolment in 1990 through to 1995. The net enrolment ratio for the girls has risen by one percent to 82% in 1995 (Table 6).

Similarly, women teachers have remained, on average, 58% of the total primary staff since 1990, increasing steadily from 57% in 1990 to 59% since 1993.

Within the present system of classes 1-7 as representing the greater proportion of primary education and classes 8-9 merely serving as the second-chance phase for moving out to Form 1, a reasonable picture of the efficiency of the system can be derived by looking at the numbers that pass the Common Entrance Examination at the end of class seven, and also the number of passes in the same examination from class 9 which provides a second chance for failures from class 7. This system is of course in the process of being revised to a six-year primary followed by a three-year Junior Secondary from 1997.