Praneeta Prakash 
More male students are dropping out of the school system, says UNICEF Pacific Representative Jonathan Veitch.
Veitch says there are still high dropout rates at the secondary school level and this remains a challenge.
He adds that more work needs to be done to ensure that male students complete their studies.
“We still have high dropout rates from secondary school, particularly boys not completing secondary education, how do we keep boys ,girl’s a little bit better, staying in school. But how do we keep boys in schools, how do we keep them learning, how do we keep them interested.”
Save the Children Fiji chief executive, Shairana Ali says there is a need to look at the inequality and the root causes.
“One of the things could contribute to that is accessibility to education and also how well boys are supported whether through by parents or also school system. It has been mentioned by communities is that they dropout because they already a have a family that they need to support.”
Ali believes that more needs to be done to empower students to complete their studies as majority are dropping out after Year nine .
