OECD, EU, G20 World Tertiary Education Rates

Tertiary education, also referred to as third-level, third-stage or postsecondary education, is the educational level following the completion of a school providing a secondary education.

Governments are increasingly looking to international comparisons of education opportunities and outcomes as they develop policies to enhance individuals' social and economic prospects, provide incentives for greater efficiency in schooling, and help to mobilise resources to meet rising demands. The OECD Directorate for Education and Skills contributes to these efforts by developing and analysing the quantitative, internationally comparable indicators that it publishes annually in Education at a Glance. Together with OECD country policy reviews, these indicators can be used to assist governments in building more effective and equitable education systems.

Some highlights from the latest edition "Education at a Glance 2019":

• Demand for tertiary education is still strong despite a larger supply of graduates
• Education systems have facilitated access to tertiary education yet some gaps remain
• Transitions from upper secondary education and tertiary admissions systems influence progression through education
• Increased funding has sustained the expansion of tertiary education
• Graduation rates from upper secondary education have increased over the past decade
• The teaching profession still struggles to attract new recruits

Country Coverage

46 * countries are covered: all 37 OECD countries, 22 (out of 27) European Union countries
(exc. Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Malta, and Romania), 17 (out of 19) Eurozone countries (exc. Cyprus and, Malta), all G20 countries and all G7 countries

Metric Coverage

In this data product, you will have 5 key indicators covered related to the tertiary education:

1. Population with Tertiary Education (PWTE) is defined as those having completed the highest level of education, by age group (includes both theoretical programmes leading to advanced research or high skill professions such as medicine and more vocational programmes leading to the labour market). The measure is percentage of same age population, also available by gender.

2. Spending on tertiary education is defined as the total expenditure on the highest level of education (covering private expenditure on schools, universities, and other private institutions delivering or supporting educational services). The measure is a percentage of total education spending.

3. Tertiary graduates by field is calculated as the share of graduates from each field over the total of graduates.

4. Tertiary graduation rate represents the estimated percentage of people who will graduate in tertiary education over their lifetime and the breakdown by gender for three levels of tertiary education.

5. Students per teaching staff is the total number of full-time equivalent students enrolled at a specific level of education divided by the total number of full-time equivalent teachers at the same level.

Data Collection Methodology

• Data is cleansed and organized to provide a ready for analysis dataset
• Data updates from OECD Data

Related Products

• OECD, EU28, G20 Life Expectancy and Mortality Indicators
• OECD, EU28, G20 Population and Demographic Indicators

• Updated annually
• Historical data available from 1981 to 2018
• Five key indicators covered related to the tertiary education
• Covering 46 countries (OECD, EU, Eurozone, G20, G7)