Spain continues to fail in school dropoutsince 27% of young people between 25 and 34 years old It only has compulsory education, which means they have a lower level than the Baccalaureate or its intermediate level equivalents in the FP. That figure doubles the average for OECD countries, according to the Education Panorama 2023 report, which was published last week. The problem doesn’t seem to matter much to anyone. because otherwise we would be talking intensively about it, and that would undoubtedly be the issue that would concentrate all the attention in the face of a possible investiture of the PP or PSOE candidate.
The improvement of human capital determines the competitive advantage of countries and is a key factor in equal opportunities. However, the public debate in Spain is not focused on education, but is now focusing on the ominous amnesty for political criminals. Unfortunately, it was not the subject of much attention during the electoral campaign either. Does anyone remember any proposals? We suffer from clear mediocrity in leadership by those who should set the priorities and essential debates.
The authors of the document OECD They remember that “investment in education produces high returns in the future” and that the objective of countries should be “to offer their citizens the possibility of obtaining quality education that promotes social mobility.” The report insists that the fundamental challenge for all governments must be to “eliminate inequalities in access to learning opportunities.” But the problem in Spain is not only school dropouts. All international comparisons show that our students, both in primary and secondary school, have a level of performance below the EU average.
Families are very concerned about being able to provide quality education, a concern that is inversely proportional to the quality of the educational system. Where it is believed to be good – such as in Germany, Sweden or the Netherlands – this concern decreases enormously, and families do not dedicate extra resources to completing their children’s education. In Spain, despite some clear improvements, public education is perceived to be of low quality, and families pay for complementary training – reinforcing mathematics or languages. which in a certain sense increases inequality because not everyone can do it, of course. The solution cannot be to limit or prohibit it, but to take educational failure seriously, if we do not want mediocrity to spread and leave us behind as a country in an increasingly competitive world. It is hard to believe that this is not the great debate in an investiture.
