Greater Equity in Education

Abstract

In recent years, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has put a considerable focus on improving equity in education outcomes. One key aspect of this has been the advent of its international testing program, PISA--the Programme for International Student Assessment--which measures the skills of 15-year-olds in more than 60 countries around the world. From its outset in 2000, PISA made equity of outcomes as important as the average level of outcomes. PISA results have demonstrated quite clearly that countries don't have to choose between excellence for some and mediocrity for all. Instead, national education systems can produce high levels of achievement with relatively low levels of inequality. Andreas Schleicher, who heads PISA, has given many eloquent talks around the world on this theme. While the rhetoric of students can learn preceded PISA, the realization that some large education systems are consistently achieving that goal has made it impossible for anyone to argue successfully that the price of education excellence must be a high level of inequality. But OECD has gone well beyond PISA in its attention to equality issues. Especially in the last 10 years, equity challenges have been a major feature of OECD education studies and reports. In February, OECD released Equity and Quality in Education: Supporting Disadvantaged Students and Schools, a follow-up to a 2007 report that suggested ways schools and systems could increase equity based on policies and practices in a number of OECD countries. The key contention of the February report is in the following two sentences from its foreword: The evidence shows that equity can go hand-in-hand with quality and that reducing school failure strengthens individuals' and societies' capacities to respond to recession and contribute to economic growth and social well-being. This means that investing in high-quality schooling and equal opportunities for all from the early years to at least the end of upper secondary is the most profitable educational policy, (p. 3) That argument is spelled out in more detail in the first part of the report and then turned into 10 policy recommendations to produce greater equity without threatening quality. These recommendations fall into two areas--system-level policies to support equity and strategies to improve performance in high-need or low-performing schools. In the first category, OECD proposes five steps: 1. Eliminate grade repetition. 2. Avoid early tracking of students (into vocational education or special education). 3. Manage school choice so that it does not lead to greater inequity. 4. Make funding more responsive to differing school needs. 5. Have more high-quality pathways in secondary schooling leading to good outcomes. In terms of working with high-need schools, the organization suggests five more strategies: 1. Strengthen school leadership. 2. Create a positive climate for learning. 3. Keep good teachers in high-need schools. 4. Ensure effective classroom practices. 5. Link closely with parents and communities. These recommendations are hardly radical. Nor should they be, since they're quite firmly grounded in many years of research. Moreover, as the report shows, each is in place in some high-performing systems so they have the sanction of empirical evidence and experience. On the other hand, few education systems have securely embedded all of these features, and quite a few systems actively contradict at least some of them. Virtually every system around the world, whether a district or a nation, could benefit from paying serious attention to the set as a whole. Why don't countries implement these policies and practices if they're known to be effective? There are at least a couple of reasons one could adduce. …