Qualifications are useful because they make skills visible. It is confidently assumed that the holder of a school-leaving certificate can read and understand instructions, and make calculations, and that those with university degrees can do much more.

Archived webinar - Low-performing Students: Why they Fall Behind and How to Help them Succeed (February 10, 2016) with Andreas Schleicher, Director for Education and Skills, OECD, and Daniel Salinas, Analyst, OECD.

School leaders are calling the PISA-based Test for Schools one of the better indicators out there of how well students are prepared for 21st century learning.

A new PISA report, Low-Performing Students: Why They Fall Behind and How to Help Them Succeed, offers an in-depth analysis of low performance at school and recommends ways to tackle the problem.

Teacher professionalism is about a teacher’s knowledge, their autonomy and their membership of peer networks. These are the key elements that lead to more effective teaching.

The number and length of school holidays differs significantly across OECD countries, meaning the number of instructional days in primary and secondary education ranges from 162 days a year in France to more than 200 days in Israel and Japan.

Primary school is a fundamental stage in children’s education. Yet it is often neglected in education research and policy debates, somehow squeezed between the seemingly more important stages of early childhood education and secondary education.

The Slovak Republic has undertaken a series of reforms to improve its education system, and the country now needs to use resources more efficiently and improve equity and inclusion in schools, according to a new OECD report.

Children and young people are among the biggest losers in the European economic and debt crisis.

A generation ago, teachers could expect that what they taught would equip their students with the skills needed for the rest of their lives.

Today, around 5 million students study and do research in a country other than their own, attracted by the quality of overseas universities and willing to complement their education portfolio with international experience.

One in ten students at the master’s or equivalent level is an international student in OECD countries, rising to one in four at the doctoral level.

Students who avoid making an effort to understand mathematics concepts may succeed in some school environments; but a lack of deep, critical and creative thinking may seriously penalise these students later in life when confronted with real, complex problems.

Fewer 15-year-olds in East Asian countries reported that they use memorisation than did 15-year-olds in some of the English-speaking countries to whom they are often compared.

Equality of opportunity is a lofty ideal, but some societies get closer to achieving it than others.

Ensuring that all people have solid foundation skills has become one of the central aims of the post-2015 development agenda.

The Survey of Adult Skills finds that even adults with the lowest proficiency in literacy possess some basic reading skills, although the level of these skills varies considerably across countries.

Over the past 15 years, Colombia’s education system has undergone an extraordinary transformation.

Colombia’s education system has made impressive progress over the past two decades, but more needs to be done now to ensure that all children have access to a quality education, according to a new OECD report.

The education sector performs well for information and communication technology (ICT) and problem-solving skills, although it still lags behind the professional, scientific and technical activities sector.

If one were to ask ministers of education what they consider to be the most important factor determining the quality of their education systems, the odds are high that they would refer to the quality of the teaching work force.

Increased life expectancy represents one of the great achievements of modern societies: living longer and better has been a dream of past generations. At the same time, it implies changes to many aspects of life.

The Survey of Adult Skills finds that adults aged 55 to 65 are less proficient in literacy and numeracy than adults aged 25 to 34. But differences in skills proficiency that are related to age vary widely across countries, implying that skills policies can affect the evolution of proficiency over a lifetime.

OECD countries differ significantly in the way spending on tertiary education is shared between public and private sources of funding, and in the financial support they provide to students.

There are few issues in education that raise as much political and ideological controversy as tuition fees for higher education.

The benefits of employers engaging with education has long been reported and promoted within policy circles.

Latvia has made good progress improving its education system since independence in 1991, but more efforts are now needed to raise teaching standards and ensure that all students have access to a quality education, according to a new OECD report.

Whoever has a hammer sees every problem as a nail. Those in the security business tend to see the answer to radicalism and terrorism in military might, and those in the financial business in cutting flows of money.

In the 2012 PISA test, urban students in Latvia outperformed rural students by the equivalent of more than a year of schooling – half a year more than the average performance difference between these two groups of students across OECD countries.

At the beginning of work-based learning programmes employers make an investment. This pays off later on when, after receiving high quality training, skilled trainees achieve higher productivity and contribute to production.

In 2011 the Social Movement for Public Education led the biggest demonstrations since Pinochet’s dictatorship in Chile. Since then, one of the main campaigns in Chilean society has been for the recognition of education as a social right, under the slogan of “free, quality, public education” (educación pública, gratuita y de calidad).

How are policy makers in the United States using data to help districts maximise their impact? And, what tools do districts need to work together in order to build stronger communities?

The Dutch school system is one of the best in the OECD, but raising standards will require further reforms to improve early childhood education, motivate students to excel and develop a career structure that attracts more high performers to the teaching profession, according to a new OECD report.

Across OECD countries, 32% of low-performing students reported that they give up easily when confronted with a difficult mathematics problem compared to only 13% of top performers.

Common sense and hard evidence point to the significant impact of socio-emotional skills such as perseverance and responsibility on children's lifetime success.

Webinar: Andreas Schleicher, Director of the OECD Directorate for Education and Skills, presents the findings of Equations and Inequalities - Making Mathematics Accessible to All

More than hundred years ago, nations that are now members of the OECD introduced legislation to set the age compulsory education.

Early childhood education and care programmes (ECEC) have become more accessible in recent years, with high enrolment rates in both early childhood educational development and preprimary education.

Many students who participated in PISA 2012 reported that they have hardly been exposed to fundamental concepts in mathematics, like arithmetic means or linear equations, which form the basis of the numeracy skills that they will need to thrive as adults.

On average across OECD countries, the 20% of students who are most exposed to pure mathematics tasks (equations) score, on the PISA mathematics test, the equivalent of almost two school years ahead of the 20% of students who are least exposed.

Employer engagement in education and training has become a hot topic for policy makers and practitioners around the world.

It’s the time of year when young people in the northern hemisphere are finishing their formal studies for the year – or for the foreseeable future.

The Survey of Adult Skills, a product of the OECD Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC), was designed to provide insights into the availability of some of these key skills in society and how they are used at work and at home.

26 Ministers and State Secretaries representing 15 countries and the European Commission gathered in Bergen, Norway, for the first Skills Summit on 29-30 June 2016. The Summit, hosted by Norway, was opened by Prime Minister Erna Solberg and the OECD’s Secretary General, Angel Gurría.

Today’s schools must equip students with the knowledge and skills they’ll need to succeed in an uncertain, constantly changing tomorrow. But many schools look much the same today as they did a generation ago, and too many teachers are not developing the pedagogies and practices required to meet the diverse needs of 21st-century learners.

Schools nowadays are required to learn faster than ever before in order to deal effectively with the growing pressures of a rapidly changing environment.

The international statistical system, one of the great achievements of international organisations, has mirrored the evolution of the nation-state.

The digital divide has shifted.

When we think of technology and education, we usually think of information and communication technologies (ICTs).

Vocational education and training can mean very different things to different people.