The expansion of education scale exceeded expectations.
In terms of quantity, the participation and output of education have been increasing for decades, and the growth rate has exceeded many forecasts. Senior high school education is almost universal in most OECD countries, and the graduation rate of school-age youth in 22 countries is higher than 70%. Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Japan, South Korea, Norway, Israel, Slovenia and other countries have a high school graduation rate of over 90%.
With the popularization of high school education, the expansion of higher education in OECD countries has been particularly rapid in recent years. The average enrollment rate of research universities is 56%, which is 20 percentage points higher than that of 1995. From the perspective of gender, the proportion of women entering colleges and universities is relatively high, accounting for about 54%, and women are most concentrated in medical and health, art, education and other majors.
In 2008, Education Overview showed the output of higher education and its changing trend over the years for the first time. The data shows that the average graduation rate of colleges and universities has increased significantly. In the past 10 years, the graduation rate of research universities in various countries has increased by 15%.
The motivation to pursue higher education is still very strong.
The impact of education on the competitiveness of the labor market is one of the focus issues in the 2008 OECD Education Overview. According to the report, the employment rate increases with the improvement of education level. Generally speaking, the employment rate of college graduates is significantly higher than that of high school graduates. With the same education, the employment rate of men is generally higher than that of women. The lower the education level, the greater the gap between the employment rate of men and women. In most cases, with the improvement of education level, income also increases accordingly.
The demand for highly educated talents in the labor market has greatly increased. The data shows that in the past 10 years, the semi-technical work in the whole OECD countries has gradually changed to technical work. Skilled jobs have increased by 4%, while the number of semi-skilled jobs is declining, and semi-skilled workers are saturated. In most OECD countries, the growth rate of skilled jobs has exceeded the growth rate of highly educated talents, and the number of jobs is also higher than that of highly educated talents, so the demand for talents has greatly increased. Israel, Canada, the United States and a few other countries have the same number of highly educated talents and technical posts, even exceeding the corresponding number of posts. Therefore, the expansion of higher education in these countries will depend on the growth of technical posts in the future.
Government investment is biased towards basic education.
The development of education is inseparable from the capital investment of various countries. Whether for the level of education expenditure or the efficiency of capital use, it is a great challenge to meet the huge educational demand and maintain the quality of education. No matter in absolute figures or in the proportion of public budget, the level of education expenditure has been greatly improved. Except Canada, France, Hungary, Portugal and Switzerland, the growth rate of education funds in all countries is not lower than that of other public sectors.
The per capita expenditure of primary and secondary education in OECD countries is on the rise, and the per capita expenditure of higher education is becoming increasingly tense. Because the investment in higher education can't keep up with the increase in the number of students, the per capita expenditure of students has decreased in some cases. The report predicts that with the increasing number of college students, the downward trend of per capita funding for higher education will be further accelerated and the gap between countries will be further widened without additional capital investment. According to the data, the per capita expenditure of Russian higher education students is $34,265,438 +0, while the per capita expenditure of Swiss and American students is more than $20,000, and the per capita expenditure of college students in different countries can reach seven times.
Expenditure on private higher education increased.
The government is actively seeking new sources of funds to cope with the rapid increase in the number of students in higher education. In the past 10 years, in at least three-quarters of OECD countries, the growth rate of private funds exceeded that of public funds. The data shows that the share of private funds in higher education funds in Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, the United States, Israel and other countries has exceeded 40%; In South Korea and Chile, private equity funds even exceeded 75%. The main responsibility of higher education is that the traditional view of the country has been gradually replaced by the idea that the cost and responsibility of education should be shared by the direct beneficiaries and the whole society. Many European countries, such as Denmark and Greece, have not increased their public investment in colleges and universities, and they are not allowed to charge their own fees. As a result, colleges and universities are in financial difficulties, which may eventually endanger the quality of teaching.
Educational welfare needs to be improved.
In fact, capital investment alone is not enough, and countries urgently need to improve the cost-benefit of capital. At the beginning of 2008, the data released by programme for international student assessment showed that there was only a slight correspondence between educational investment and academic performance in all countries of the world. The cumulative education expenditure of South Korea and the Netherlands is lower than the average level of OECD countries, but their students' test scores are among the best in all countries. This shows that although funds are indispensable, they are not the whole of quality education.
From the perspective of higher education, on the one hand, we need to consider how to increase capital investment, on the other hand, we need to find key areas to improve quality and efficiency in the education system and allocate resources more effectively. The challenge facing higher education will be how to achieve the goal of giving consideration to both scale and quality without affecting educational equity.