Children and young adults with an immigrant background

The following is a brief summary of the key features in the report.

Demography

This chapter describes young immigrants and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents (aged 0-24 years) and the composition and structure for these groups. Statistics Norway’s population statistics show that children and young adults with an immigrant background (aged 0-24 years) constitute an increasingly large proportion of the 0-24 year- old population. At the beginning of 2015, this group made up 15.5 per cent of the population aged 0-24 years. The corresponding proportion in 2009 was 11 per cent.

Without immigrants and Norwegian- born to immigrant parents, the young population (under 25 years) would decrease.

Poles and Somalis make up the two largest groups of young immigrants in Norway, while the two largest groups among Norwegian-born to immigrant parents are persons with a background from Pakistan and Somalia. All Norwegian municipalities had persons with an immigrant background (aged 0-24 years). Oslo had the largest population of young immigrants and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents, both in relative terms and absolute figures. These groups constitute 34 per cent of the capital’s entire population under the age of 25. The suburbs with the highest proportions of young immigrants and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents were Stovner, Alna, Grorud and Søndre Nordstrand, each with over 50 per cent.

Education

The proportion of children with a minority background in kindergartens in Norway has increased significantly in recent years, from nearly 5 per cent in 1998 to more than 14 per cent in 2014.

A relatively small share of elementary school pupils received mother tongue instruction or bilingual subject instruction. This instruction was most often given in Polish and Somalian. The figures from 2014 show that 97 per cent of all pupils started upper secondary education immediately after completing lower secondary school. The transitional percentage among Norwegian-born to immigrant parents was 98 per cent, compared to 83 per cent for immigrants.

The accomplishment rate for pupils with an immigrant background is lower, and the percentage of pupils dropping out is higher than for all pupils in upper secondary education.

The proportion of pupils who continued directly to tertiary education in Norway or abroad was higher for immigrants and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents than for all pupils as a Whole.

Income and property

This chapter shows that immigrants and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents have a lower income level than the rest of the population. Households with children experience a slower income growth than other households. Immigrant children and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents from Africa, Asia etc. are considerably over- represented in the low income group.

The economic independence of immigrant households often improves the longer they have been in Norway, but these figures vary considerably depending on country of origin.