Transitions from Unemployment to Education in Europe: The Role of Educational Policies

Abstract

AbstractThe aim of this study is to investigate cross-country variability in transition rates from unemployment to further education among young adults, as well as how barriers in educational systems affect these transition rates. Previous research on adult further education has largely neglected the role of policies, and has not taken unemployed people into account.Two dimensions of educational policies are investigated. (1) Barriers facing prospective students with regard to previous academic achievements (e.g. second chance opportunities); and (2) financial barriers (e.g. high costs). It is hypothesized that low barriers are associated with higher transition rates into education, especially for unemployed young adults with lower levels of education.The aim is approached by investigating how differences in transition rates across countries are linked to the design of educational policies. Cross-country standardised individual-level panel data from 29 European countries are taken from EU-SILC. Multilevel multinomial models are fitted.Results show that lower barriers in the education system are associated with higher probabilities that unemployed young adults leave unemployment to re-enter further education, although only partial support is found for the hypothesis that unemployed young adults with lower levels of education gain relatively more from low barriers. Low barriers are sometimes associated with lower transition rates into employment.