Earmarking Justice

by Justine Doody
Freelance Journalist and Editor, SGI News

In his State of the Union address on 12 February 2013, US President Barack Obama proposed a new initiative to improve access to high-quality early childhood education. The action is much needed: according to OECD figures from 2010, only 51 per cent of US children were enrolled in pre-primary education at age three, rising to 69 per cent at age four.

By comparison, in New Zealand, which became in 1986 the second country in the world to have its ministry of education take responsibility for early childhood education, 95 per cent of children in 2012 had been through an early childhood education programme before starting school at five years old.

Early childhood education is linked to improved prospects for future learning and employment. And, as the new Intergenerational Justice Index (IJI) study from the Bertelsmann Foundation's Sustainable Governance Indicators (SGI) project shows, it can help to level the playing field in terms of allocating resources fairly between older and younger generations.

As demographic changes lead to ageing populations in many OECD countries, the increased weight of older people in voting systems means they have more power than ever before to direct policy preferences. So, more than ever, it is important that countries take steps to ensure their policies provide future generations with at least the same chances that their parents and grandparents had.

Estonia Ranks Top, the United States Bottom

To find out which countries best provide for younger and future generations, SGI's Intergenerational Justice Index (IJI) measured OECD countries on several indicators: ecological footprint, child poverty, public debt per child and spending bias towards older generations.

The best performing country, SGI found, was Estonia, while New Zealand achieved a creditable fourth place. The United States ranked bottom of all the 29 countries studied, followed by Japan and Italy. If these countries do not change their current policy directions, their young people will grow up facing burdens of injustice, in terms of public debt, ecological degradation, and social immobility, that will be difficult, if not impossible, to overcome.

IJI offers policy recommendations that could help to shift the balance and help countries to improve their levels of intergenerational justice. The study suggests intergenerational earmarking as a way to rebalance public spending towards the young. Revenues raised in addressing one form of intergenerational justice, for example, environmental taxes, could be used to mitigate other areas of injustice, for instance by offering child tax credits or family allowances.

Proxy Votes for Children Could Foster Intergenerational Justice

Another interesting, albeit potentially controversial, recommendation is the introduction of proxy voting for children. Parents would be given the right to vote on behalf of their children, with a child's vote equalling one-half of an adult vote. In this way, children would be given a voice in politics, and parents would be rewarded for their societal contribution.

High-quality early childhood education is especially important. Research has found that children who participate in early childhood programmes are more likely to graduate from high school, hold down jobs, and earn more money. They are less likely to find themselves on state welfare or to go to prison.

The experience of high-quality early childhood education particularly benefits children from disadvantaged backgrounds, which means that providing early childhood programmes could work as a corrective social justice measure as well as an intergenerational rebalancing.

In New Zealand, beginning in 2007, three-year-olds were offered two free years of pre-school. Children attend programmes for 20 hours a week, 48 weeks of the year. The government hopes that by 2016, 98 per cent of children will receive early childhood education.

But despite this excellent record, there are concerns about the programme's future. Education unions complain that funding cuts are affecting the quality of early childhood education. Recently, the word 'free' was removed from the government strategy; now, almost half of early childhood education providers, hit by increasing costs and lower subsidies, are asking for extra fees from parents. Shifting costs onto parents could limit the availability of high-quality education for disadvantaged families.

Prospects for the US Seem Bleak

The US government says that in the United States, only 3 in 10 four-year-olds have access to high-quality early childhood education programmes. Socio-economically disadvantaged children are least likely to be in early childhood education programmes: just 59 per cent of the poorest US children are in pre-kindergarten, as compared to 90 per cent of children from wealthier homes. The president's programme is to implement free access to high-quality pre-school for all four-year-olds from families at or below 200 per cent of the poverty line.

To receive federal funding, states would have to meet strict requirements. All teachers must have a bachelor’s degree and be given access to on-going professional development. Teachers’ salaries should be comparable to those for teachers in higher levels of the education system. Class sizes should remain small and activities should cover the entire school day. Curricula should measure up to state standards and programmes must be continuously evaluated. As it stands, few states would be able to meet these strict standards and qualify for federal money.

However, it is unclear how the US programme would be financed. The president’s 2014 budget proposal includes a plan to pay for universal preschool by increasing taxes on cigarettes, which could have positive public health outcomes as well as providing a revenue stream for the programme. But even if the tax succeeded in getting past the vested interests that would oppose it, such “sin taxes” have diminishing returns over time, raising questions about future funding.

Any new federal funding is supposed to be matched by state funding. But because of budget constraints, many states have already cut funding for their existing early childhood education programmes, casting doubt on their willingness to provide more dollars for a new federal initiative.

And the larger, on-going struggle between those who wish to cut government spending in the name of austerity and those who favour Keynesian expansion seems to be resolving itself in favour of the budget-cutters.

So, even in the face of the overwhelming evidence that early childhood education has economic benefits that go beyond the moral claims of social and intergenerational justice, the future of the US initiative is uncertain. Absent new will to act from both sides of the US political divide, the prospects for the United States improving its dismal rating on intergenerational justice seem bleak.

Links
Find out more on OECD work on Early Childhood Education and Care
Education at a Glance 2012
Starting Strong; Starting Strong II; Starting Strong III
Doing Better for Families
Photo credit: Bulb idea with human hand / Shutterstock

Evolving attitudes towards early childhood education

by Barbara Ischinger
Director for Education and Skills

I was in Berlin recently to launch the German edition of Starting Strong III at an international conference on early childhood education and care and was struck by the difference in attitudes I found there compared to even a decade ago. Given the effects of the economic crisis and the ageing of European populations, more governments are realising that it is becoming unsustainable to continue to expect – and encourage – young mothers to stay at home with their children until the age of five or six, when primary school begins. Eight or nine years ago, Germany, to name just one country, hadn’t yet come to grips with the broader role that young mothers could play in society. The German Lander have come to agree with the federal government that as of August 1, 2013 all parents should have the right to enroll their children at the age of one.

Of course, early childhood education is not just about encouraging half of the adult population to enter the labour market; it’s about giving children a better chance to succeed later on. Results from PISA show that 15-year-old students who attended pre-primary education for more than one year score higher in the PISA reading test than their peers who did not attend. In Germany, for example, the difference between the two groups in reading performance in the 2009 assessment was the equivalent of one year of schooling, even after taking students’ socio-economic backgrounds into account.

That is, perhaps, the greatest benefit of high-quality pre-primary education: in theory, it gives all children equal opportunities to begin to develop their literacy, numeracy and social skills, regardless of their family’s income. If conceived with some imagination, these programmes can make an enormous difference in the lives of disadvantaged families. For example, New Zealand developed early education programmes, targeted to families with low levels of education, that include an adult-education component. In regions where these programmes are offered, enrolment of disadvantaged children – who benefit the most from these kinds of activities – has grown considerably.

Yet while participation rates in pre-primary education are rising, there are some worrying trends in how these programmes are financed and delivered. In OECD countries, more than 18% of total spending on pre-primary education (and more than 25% in Germany) comes from private sources – a far higher rate than for other levels of education. Since most of that money comes from households, it isn’t surprising that many people are concerned that access to early childhood education isn’t as equitable as it could and should be. And as any young parent trying to find a place for their child in one of these programmes knows, all programmes are not equal when it comes to quality. This is where Starting Strong III can help. It provides a toolkit for countries to use to improve the quality of their early childhood education programmes.

Over the next couple of years, the OECD will be working to define how to measure and assess the quality of the education provided in these programmes, which will be the first step towards ensuring that high-quality pre-primary education is available to all. In the meantime, I’m encouraged to see so many governments not only acknowledging the importance of early childhood education but making it a top priority on their agendas. It has taken a while, but I think we all now realise that high-quality pre-primary education is a public good that demands our critical attention and unstinting support.

Find out more on: OECD work on Early Childhood Education and Care
Photo credit: Small and colourful table and chairs for little kids / Shutterstock

Getting the best start

Miho Taguma
Senior Analyst, Early Childhood and Schools Division, Directorate for Education and Skills

Given the current background of fiscal constraint, is public funding of early childhood education and care programmes a sound investment?

As more and more women have been entering the labour force since the 1970s, access to pre-school services has improved across OECD countries. Although in the 1970s and 1980s, early childhood education and care policy was put into place to facilitate women’s entry into the labour force, in recent years it has become more child-centred, focusing instead on the child’s development and improving educational outcomes. As inequalities, which are often present well before children begin primary school, are likely to increase over time, early childhood policies can be a component of anti-poverty and educational equity measures as well.

As the latest issue of the OECD’s brief series Education Indicators in Focus shows, countries vary widely on all aspects of early childhood education and care, from their policies and systems to their quality. In most countries, the proportion of children enrolled in pres-school programmes has significantly grown in recent decades. Although on average across the OECD, 79% of 4-year-olds are enrolled in such programmes, it ranges from more than 95% in Belgium, France, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain and the United Kingdom, to between 30% and 60% in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Finland, Greece, Poland and Switzerland, and to less than 30% in Indonesia and Turkey.

But what are the benefits of early childhood programmes? PISA scores have shown how important access to these programmes can be for improving children’s outcomes in later stages of life. Data also shows that pre-school can improve children’s cognitive abilities and have a positive impact on reading performance at age 15. It also helps children, especially those from disadvantaged or immigrant backgrounds, to build a strong foundation for life skills. But what is more important, quantity or quality?

There are also vast differences among countries on all of the quality indicators: from the number of children per staff – which ranges from more than 20 pupils per teacher in China, France, Israel, Mexico and Turkey, to fewer than 10 in Chile, Iceland, New Zealand, Slovenia and Sweden – to the length of the programmes – with the majority of countries offering at least one year of  for free, including the Netherlands (for 4  and 5 year olds); England and Scotland (for 3  and 4 year olds); and France, Israel, Mexico, Portugal and Sweden (for all 3 6-year-olds).

Countries’ expenditure on ECE as a percentage of GDP also varies significantly – ranging from 0.1% or less in Australia, India, Indonesia, Ireland and South Africa to 0.8% or more in Denmark, Iceland, Israel, the Russian Federation and Spain.

The bottom line is that even in these times of fiscal consolidation and crisis, sufficient public funding should continue to be dedicated to early childhood programmes. This would help not only to improve children’s outcomes, social mobility from generation to generation and long-term efficiency gains for society, but also reduce poverty and protect the most vulnerable.

For more information
On this topic, visit:
Education Indicators in Focus: www.oecd.org/education/indicators 
On the OECD’s education indicators, visit:
Education at a Glance 2012: OECD Indicators: www.oecd.org/edu/eag2012 
On the OECD’s Indicators of Education Systems (INES) programme, visit:
INES Programme overview brochure
Chart source: OECD.  Argentian and Indonesia: UNESCO Institute for Statistics (World Indicators Programme).  Table C2.1.  See Annex 3 for notes (www.oecd.org/edu/eag2012)

A lesson in teaching from the grassroots

by Andreas Schleicher
Deputy Director for Education and Special Advisor on Education Policy to the OECD's Secretary General

I was in London last week to give a talk on “how to transform 10,000 classrooms” at the annual Teach First/Teach for All conference in London. Some 3,000 teachers and social entrepreneurs from around the world gathered there to discuss ways to re-invent and strengthen the teaching profession. The aspiration of the organisations under the Teach for All umbrella is to enlist promising future leaders from across academic disciplines and careers to teach at least two years in high-need schools and become lifelong promoters of educational quality and equity.

The enthusiasm, commitment and growing professionalism of these grassroots organisations was inspiring. I heard many stories of people who had left successful careers to join the teaching force in order to make a significant impact on the lives of disadvantaged children. In some countries, participation levels have reached the critical mass to have a transformative impact on student achievement, and have made the success of this work both scalable and sustainable. Wendy Kopp, who co-founded Teach for America 22 years ago, recounted the evolution of her organisation from a small group of friends to one that reaches more than 750,000 students. In New Orleans, 25% of teachers are now from Teach for America. In the UK, too, Teach First is now the third largest recruiter of graduates and reaches over 150,000 children.

Still more impressive were the stories told by the young participants who had designed and were delivering intensive training courses for 400 teachers per year in Nigeria – a country with an essentially non-existent teacher-training infrastructure; and a participant from China shared how she was collaborating with local governments to build urgently needed teaching capacity in remote rural areas.

Critics of these organisations maintain that there is just no alternative to the traditional route of undergraduate studies, teacher training and then a career in the classroom. But those critics may simply underestimate the potential for creativity in the field of education that this combination of talent, passion and experience represents. The fact that, in many countries, these programmes are now so attractive that they can recruit the most promising candidates, even where the general status of the teaching profession is in decline, speaks for itself. We should also not overlook the rapid professionalisation of these organisations, which combine intensive initial training, ongoing support, and a work environment in which teachers work together to create good practice. They also offer intelligent pathways for teachers to grow in their careers, and support teachers in their efforts to find innovative ways of teaching.

What struck me most is the vision of social transformation behind all this work – extending from teacher leadership through school leadership, policy and political leadership, up to community organisation. The work of these organisations can complement the OECD’s efforts to design and implement policies by challenging the teaching profession and education systems from within. We should do what we can to engage with them.

Links:

Preparing Teachers and Developing School Leaders for the 21st Century: Lessons from around the world

OECD Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS)

Strong Performers and Successful Reformers in Education

Photo credit: Grass roots / Shutterstock

Looking for equity in education? Follow the (public) money

by Marilyn Achiron
Editor, Directorate for Education

Talk of school vouchers inevitably triggers heated debate: do they give all students equal access to quality education? Or do they transfer resources away from precisely those schools that need them the most and inadvertently create a two-tier system of education?

This month’s PISA in Focus highlights results from PISA 2009 show that while privately managed schools do tend to attract advantaged students, the scale of the difference between the socio-economic profiles of publicly and privately managed schools is associated with the level of public funding allocated to privately managed schools – and with how that funding is provided.

In Finland, the Netherlands, the Slovak Republic, Sweden and the partner economy Hong Kong-China, principals in privately managed schools reported that over 90% of school funding comes from the government, while in Belgium, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Luxembourg and Slovenia, between 80% and 90% does. In contrast, less than 10% of funding for privately managed schools in Greece, Mexico, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, the United States, the partner countries Albania, Brazil, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Qatar, Panama, Peru, Tunisia, Uruguay and the partner economies Dubai (UAE), Chinese Taipei and Shanghai-China comes from the government. PISA data reveal that in those countries where privately managed schools receive higher proportions of public funding, there is less of a difference between the socio-economic profiles of publicly and privately managed schools.

To refine these results further, PISA considered two systems through which public funding to privately managed schools is offered directly to parents: universal voucher systems, in which vouchers are available to all students, and targeted voucher systems, in which vouchers are provided only to disadvantaged students. Vouchers that are available for all students can help to expand the choice of schools available to parents and promote competition among schools; vouchers that target only disadvantaged students can help improve equity in access to schools. An analysis of PISA data shows that the difference between the socio-economic profiles of publicly managed schools and privately managed schools is twice as large in education systems that use universal vouchers as in systems that use targeted vouchers.

But PISA results also show that providing more public funding to privately managed schools will not necessarily eliminate that difference: other factors that are unrelated to funding, such as a school’s admittance criteria, academic performance, and learning environment, are also partly related to differences between schools’ socio-economic profiles.

What is crucial to take away from this analysis is that countries that manage to have small differences between the socio-economic profiles of publicly and privately managed schools also tend to achieve better overall performance. That means that policy makers – and ultimately parents and students – do not have to choose between equity and strong performance in their school systems: the two are not mutually exclusive.

Links:

For more information on PISA: www.oecd.org/pisa/

PISA in Focus No. 19: Is there really such a thing as a second chance in education? 

Photo credit:  apple target / Shutterstock

How can education help tackle rising income inequality?

By Ji Eun Chung
Innovation and Measuring Progress Division, Directorate for Education

See instructions below for how to read the chart

The gap between the rich and poor has widened in OECD countries over the past 30 years. As the latest issue of the OECD’s new brief series Education Indicators in Focus describes, the average income of the richest 10% of people in OECD countries was about nine times greater than the income of the poorest 10% before the onset of the global economic crisis. This ratio was 5 to 1 in the 1980s.

What’s more, existing income inequality may also limit the income prospects of future generations in some countries. In countries with higher income inequality – such as Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States – a child’s future earnings are likely to be similar to his or her father’s, suggesting that socio-economic background plays a large role in the development of children’s skills and abilities. Meanwhile, in countries with lower income inequality – like Denmark, Finland, and Norway – a child’s future income is not as strongly related to his or her family’s income status. In these countries, the development of children’s skills and abilities has a weaker link with socio-economic factors.

The implications for education policy are clear. Education policies focusing on equity in education may be a particularly useful way for countries to increase earnings mobility between generations and reduce income inequality over time. Countries can work towards this goal by giving equal opportunities to both disadvantaged and advantaged students to achieve strong academic outcomes – laying a pathway for them to continue on to higher levels of education and eventually secure good jobs.

Four top performers on the 2009 PISA reading assessment show the potential of this approach. Canada, Finland, Japan, and Korea all have education systems that put a strong focus on equity – and all have yielded promising results. In each of these countries, relatively few students performed at lower proficiency levels on the PISA reading assessment, and high proportions of students performed better than would be expected, given their socio-economic background.

Yet while each of these countries focuses on equity, they’ve pursued it in different ways. In Japan and Korea, for example, teachers and principals are often reassigned to different schools, fostering more equal distribution of the most capable teachers and school leaders. Finnish schools assign specially-trained teachers to support struggling students who are at risk of dropping out. The teaching profession is a highly selective occupation in Finland, with highly-skilled, well-trained teachers spread throughout the country. In Canada, equal or greater educational resources – such as supplementary classes – are provided to immigrant students, compared to non-immigrant students. This is believed to have boosted immigrant students’ performance.

Income inequality is a challenging issue that demands a wide range of solutions. In a world of growing inequality, focusing on equity in education may be an effective approach to tackle it over the long run.

For more information
On this topic, visit:
Education Indicators in Focus: www.oecd.org/education/indicators
Equity and Quality in Education - Supporting Disadvantaged Students and Schools
On the OECD’s education indicators, visit:
Education at a Glance 2011: OECD Indicators: www.oecd.org/edu/eag2011
Divided we stand: Why inequality keeps rising: www.oecd.org/els/social/inequality
On the OECD’s Indicators of Education Systems (INES) programme, visit:
INES Programme overview brochure

Chart source: Source: D'Addio (2012, forthcoming), “Social Mobility in OECD countries: Evidence and Policy Implications”; OECD (2008), Growing Unequal?, www.oecd.org/els/social/inequality/GU; OECD Income distribution database.


How to read the chart: This chart shows the relationship between earnings mobility between generations of a family, and the prevalence of income inequality in different countries. Overall, countries with higher levels of income inequality tend to have lower earnings mobility between generations, while countries with lower levels of income inequality tend to have higher earnings mobility.

Tackling inequity

by Barbara Ischinger
Director for Education

What struck me most about the international roundtable on early childhood education and care that I attended late last month in Oslo was the simple fact that this topic attracted such intense interest. It probably wouldn’t have happened a decade ago. The fact that it’s happening now, even as most of the countries represented at the meeting are in the midst of an economic crisis, is an encouraging sign. It shows that more governments understand that equity of opportunity has to begin in the first years of life, in the earliest years of a child’s education, in order to give everyone a fair chance to succeed later on.

As recent headlines repeatedly tell us, and as is evident just looking around us, equity has become something of an endangered ideal. And this is, unfortunately, just as true in education as in many other areas of life. OECD research finds that one in five students does not complete secondary school; yet our research also shows that those 15-year-olds, regardless of their socio-economic backgrounds, who had attended pre-primary education perform better on PISA than those who did not. In other words, give all children a good start and you give them the tools and the confidence to meet the challenges that arise later on in their lives.

It is easy to argue, particularly when governments are forced to make tough economic choices, that this kind of inclusiveness in education is too expensive to introduce and maintain, that the quality of the education provided would, inevitably, suffer. But some countries–Poland is one notable example–have already proven that inclusiveness and quality in education are not mutually exclusive. Indeed, I would argue that inclusiveness improves quality for all concerned, as it is to the advantage of society as a whole when people from different backgrounds learn with and from each other.

That is precisely the premise of Equity and Quality in Education: Supporting Disadvantaged Students and Schools, which is published today. In essence, countries in the industrialised world cannot afford not to invest in quality early childhood, primary and secondary education for all: the cost to society later on–in high rates of unemployment, in poor health, in increasing criminal activity–would be far greater.

Many governments of OECD countries are now talking of structural reform to tackle complex problems cost-effectively; inequity–in education and in general–should be at the top of the agenda. In fact, education is no longer, if it ever was, an isolated issue. Education reform requires an all-government approach, involving policies related to such disparate domains as housing and taxation. It also requires commitment, both financial and philosophical. All governments say they want to tackle the problem of growing inequity that, left unchecked, could threaten the stability of our societies. Investing in quality education for all is one of the best ways of doing so.

Links: 
More information about OECD work on equity in education: www.oecd.org/edu/equity
Equity and Quality in Education - Supporting Disadvantaged Students and Schools
Education at a Glance 2011: OECD Indicators
OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA)

Photo credit: © Brian Kennedy/Flickr/Getty Images

Improving equity in education: a critical challenge

Improving equity in student outcomes remains a critical challenge for every country in the OECD.  Even those countries with the lowest levels of inequity must still be concerned with gaps in outcomes that are not related to students’ motivation and capacity, while in other countries the inequities are so large as to pose a fundamental challenge to ongoing security and prosperity.

The new report, Equity and Quality in Education: Supporting Disadvantaged Students and Schools, provides a cogent analysis and many ideas for addressing these issues.  The report provides a blueprint for any country that wishes to make genuine progress in promoting equity while also improving quality.  These ideas are well grounded in the best available research evidence (though in some cases that evidence is not as strong as one would want, simply due to insufficient research on many important educational issues).

The larger issue is whether countries will have the will and skill to make these changes.  As outlined in my 2008 book, ‘How to Change 5000 Schools’, knowing what to do is important but not enough.  In many cases we already know what to do, but we do not do it.  As a simple example, consider physical exercise and good eating habits.  Everyone knows these are essential to health, yet many people simply do not do them.  How much more difficult to make changes in a large and complex institution like a school system!

There are two aspects to effective implementation of the right changes.  The first is whether the will exists to make the changes.  In many cases the beneficiaries of the status quo will be vocal in opposing anything that they think might diminish the relative advantage of their children.  Less streaming is one good example of this situation, often opposed by parents and teachers who benefit from a streamed system despite the strong evidence that this practice is, overall, a bad one.  There can be very difficult politics around making some of the changes that would actually benefit students.  These conflicts cannot be ignored; they must be faced directly.

Second, and just as important, is whether systems have the capacity to bring real change about.  As the report notes, real improvement requires real changes in classroom practice.  These do not occur through issuing policy statements, developing new curricula, or even through changes in accountability and testing.  Changing people’s daily behavior takes sustained and relentless attention to the way daily work is done.  This attention must extend over time and take into account everything the organization does.  Very few countries have this capacity.  Very few ministries of education have much capacity to lead and support school improvement.  Very few school leaders know how to do this work.

Countries that are serious about greater equity – and greater quality – will need to consider carefully how they can support real and lasting implementation of the necessary changes.  Luckily, the OECD does offer some examples, in its higher performing countries, of the kinds of organizational measures that are needed to achieve these important goals.  We know this can be done; the question is how many countries will make the required effort.

Links:
More information about OECD work on equity in education: www.oecd.org/edu/equity
Executive Summary: Equity and Quality in Education - Supporting Disadvantaged Students and Schools

Photo: School wall mural painting by students, Ontario 

Helping immigrant students to succeed

by Marilyn Achiron
Editor, Indicators and Analysis Division, Directorate for Education

Whether in flight from conflict, with the hope of building a better life, or to seize a social or economic opportunity, people have been crossing borders for as long as there have been borders to cross. Modern means of transportation and communication, the globalisation of the labour market, and the ageing of populations in OECD countries will drive migration well into the next decades. Education is key to helping immigrants and their families integrate into their adopted countries. How are education systems adapting?

Results from PISA 2009 show that although native students generally outperform students with immigrant backgrounds, some countries have been able to narrow the performance gap between the two groups considerably—even as the proportion of immigrant students has grown.

The latest issue of PISA in Focus notes that the percentage of 15-year-old students with an immigrant background grew by two percentage points, on average, between 2000 and 2009 among OECD countries  with comparable data. Immigrant students now constitute more than 5% of the 15-year-old student populations in 13 OECD and partner countries and economies. In Ireland, New Zealand, Spain, the United States, and the partner countries Liechtenstein and the Russian Federation, the percentage of students with an immigrant background increased by five percentage points or more over the past decade, and these students now represent from 8% to 30% of these countries’ student populations.

During the same time period, a few countries narrowed the performance gap between native and immigrant students. In Belgium and Switzerland, for example, the performance gap shrank by nearly 40 score points, even though native students still outperform students with an immigrant background by 68 score points in Belgium and by 48 score points in Switzerland. And Switzerland was able to reduce the performance gap despite the fact that the percentage of students with an immigrant background rose during the period. Germany, New Zealand and the partner country Liechtenstein also show a narrowing of the performance gap between these two groups of students.

What these trends tell us is that there are ways that governments and schools can help students from immigrant backgrounds to overcome some of the disadvantages associated with that background. Often, students with an immigrant background are socio-economically disadvantaged. On average across OECD countries, the performance gap is reduced from 43 to 27 score points when comparing students of similar socio-economic status, regardless of whether they are from immigrant backgrounds or are native to the country in which they were tested.

But the fact that a 27-point performance gap–equivalent to well over half a school year–persists, even after accounting for socio-economic status, implies that other factors also have an impact on student performance. These may be related to whether the students were born in the country in which they were tested or elsewhere, or whether, when they’re at home, they speak the same language as that used in the PISA test. Yet given that the performance gap varies so widely across countries, even taking into account these other characteristics, and given that in some countries the performance gap has changed markedly over time, it is clear that public policy can make a difference to these students’ progress in school.

For more information:
on PISA: www.pisa.oecd.org
Full set of PISA in Focus: www.oecd.org/pisa/infocus
PISA 2009 Results: Overcoming Social Background
PISA 2009 Results: Learning Trends

Related blog posts:
All immigration is local: How Regional Factors Shape Global Migration