Over the past decades, education systems have expanded enormously. They provide opportunities for many more students than before to access and succeed in secondary and tertiary education.

Education systems have made major strides to close gender gaps in student performance but girls and boys remain deeply divided in career choices, which are being made much earlier than commonly thought, according to a new OECD report.

Gender differences still exist in certain fields, with more men studying science, computing and engineering, and with women dominating education and health and welfare.

Last Saturday, 14 April, Equal Pay Day reminded the world again of the large gap between men’s and women’s wages. Eradicating unjustifiable gender inequalities in earnings seems to be very hard to accomplish.

When choosing a school for their child, parents in all participating countries value academic achievement highly; but they are often even more concerned about the safety and environment of the school and the school’s reputation.

Analysing the efficiency of education systems and organisations is at the forefront of today’s policy and academic debate.

More than 35 million 16-29 year-olds across OECD countries are neither employed nor in education or training (NEET) – and around half of all NEETs are out of school and not looking for work. These young people are likely to have dropped off the radar of their country’s education, social and labour market systems.

When it comes to technology, education seems stuck in the age of chalkboards. But at an international conference on technology in education, held in Qingdao, China, last week, I got the feeling that educators and education ministers might finally be ready to join the technological revolution.

Educational opportunities have a very important impact on a person’s life. Employment, earnings, well-being, health and trust are all strongly related to education and skills. A lack of high-quality educational opportunities is the most important way in which poverty, social inequality and exclusion are transmitted from one generation to another.

Countries and economies participating in PISA have invested substantial resources and used a wide variety of strategies during the past ten years to improve the quality of their schools. Have these efforts paid off?

Norway’s early childhood education and care (ECEC) system has experienced a strong expansion over the last decade. More children than ever are enrolled in its kindergartens.

One of the most dramatic consequences of the economic crisis has been the soaring levels of youth unemployment in several OECD countries; and the hesitant recovery of the past years was insufficient to improve the job prospects of young people.

This review describes variations in, and evidence for, pedagogical approaches in formal early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings; how pedagogy is monitored; and which policies affect pedagogical practice. Its specific focus is on comparisons of England (United Kingdom) with Japan, France, Germany, Denmark and New Zealand.

In just a couple of decades, upper secondary schooling has been transformed from a vehicle towards upward social mobility into a minimum requirement for life in modern societies.

In most OECD countries, the large majority of adults had at least an upper secondary qualification in 2013, making the completion of upper secondary education the minimum threshold for successful labour market entry and continued employability or the pursuit of further education.

The top-performing country in the PISA assessment of digital reading was Singapore, followed by Korea, Hong Kong-China, Japan, Canada and Shanghai-China.

The answer appears to be yes. Schooling plays a surprisingly large role in short-changing the most economically disadvantaged students of critical math skills, according to a study published today in Educational Researcher, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Educational Research Association.

On average across OECD countries, students’ belief that they can solve mathematics problems (mathematics self-efficacy) is associated with a difference of 49 score points in mathematics – the equivalent of one year of school.

The latest report in the OECD’s Starting Strong series reviews the monitoring systems of 24 jurisdictions and reveals that monitoring does not merely encompass regulatory compliance but is moving towards better understanding what is happening inside an ECEC setting and how a child develops in several areas.

Education systems are not static; they change. There have been some important changes at both ends of the education ladder recently: in early childhood or “pre-primary” education, at one end, and in tertiary or higher education at the other.

Graduation rates for bachelor’s and master’s degrees have dramatically increased over the past two decades, with 6 million bachelor’s degrees and 3 million master’s degrees awarded in OECD countries in 2013. Although women represent over half of the graduates at the bachelor’s and master’s level, they are still strikingly under-represented in the fields of sciences and engineering.

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.

No country or economy participating in PISA 2012 can claim that all of its 15-year-old students have achieved basic proficiency skills in mathematics, reading and science. Some 28% of students score below the baseline level of proficiency in at least one of those subjects, on average across OECD countries

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.

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

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.

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.

Even when all students, including the most disadvantaged, have easy access to the Internet,a digital divide, based on socio-economic status, still persists in how students use technology.

Peru has been one of the strongest economic performers in Latin America with steady GDP per capita growth over the past decade.

Since 2009, Education at a Glance (EAG) has included an indicator on education and social outcomes using data from different surveys.

As governments around the world seek to tackle stubbornly high levels of youth unemployment, new attention has been focused on the relationship between education and employment.

Modern education systems, which are open to the middle classes and the poor, not just the elites, were established during the first industrial revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Most people see social inequities in education as stubbornly persistent.

There is little doubt that in OECD countries, the chances for boys and girls to succeed and contribute to society have become more equal over the past century.

On average across OECD countries, almost one in four students – whether boy or girl – expects to work in an occupation that requires further science training beyond compulsory education. This brief highlights the kinds of science careers 15-year-olds anticipate for themselves in the future.

Ukraine has taken ambitious steps to tackle bribery and corruption across government, including public procurement and, law enforcement. It should now step up its efforts to tackle integrity risks and violations in education, such as unmerited grades, misappropriated school funds, and preferential access to schools and study programmes - according to a new OECD report.

Well-designed policies could help address the outstanding issues in the ECEC profession and work environment in Kazakhstan. Some potential options for Kazakhstan are suggested in this report, based on its findings and the background report prepared by Kazakhstan and supplemented by a survey of policy options and country experiences.

New teachers are more likely to feel prepared in the content of their subject field(s), rather than the pedagogy or classroom practice of their subject field(s).

One of the greatest challenge for new teachers, does not come from not knowing what to teach, but from not knowing how to teach what they know and how to manage a classroom in all its strange and exciting complexity.

Why is it that even highly educated migrants to OECD countries are less likely to be employed than native-born adults who are similarly educated, even if the migrants have lived in their host country for several years?

Join Andreas Schleicher, Director of the OECD Directorate for Education and Skills, and Éric Charbonnier, analyst in the Early Childhood and Schools division, who will present the main findings from Starting Strong V - Transitions from Early Childhood Education and Care to Primary Education.

Countries should step up their efforts to provide affordable and high-quality early childhood education and care (ECEC) to improve social mobility and give all children the chance to fulfil their potential, according to a new OECD report.

The transition from early childhood education to primary school is a big step for all children, and a step which more and more children are having to take. Quality transitions should be well-prepared and child-centred, managed by trained staff collaborating with one another, and guided by an appropriate and aligned curriculum.

There is now a widespread consensus that high-quality early childhood education is critically important for children. Research continues to find that early childhood education can compensate for a lack of learning opportunities at home, and can help children begin to develop the social and emotional skills needed for success later in life.

The combined effects of policy reforms to attract and/or retain teachers, and financial constraints in the context of the economic downturn in 2008 may explain part of the recent trends in teachers’ salaries: decreases in statutory salaries and smaller salary gaps between levels of education.

The challenge that youth are facing, first and foremost, is skills for employability. It is a fundamental issue. What we have realised in education is that going to school has not necessarily translated into quality learning.

Career decisions are wrought in complexities. Many students start by looking at their interests, selecting a career in line with their personal affinities or aspirations.

Although girls and boys perform similarly in the PISA science assessment at age 15, girls are less likely than boys to envision a career in science and engineering, even in countries where they outperform them.

Successes and failures in the classroom will increasingly shape the fortunes of countries. And yet, more of the same education will only produce more of the same strengths and weaknesses.