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This book provides, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the educational evaluation and assessment framework, current policy initiatives, and possible future approaches in Luxembourg.

This book provides, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the educational evaluation and assessment framework, current policy initiatives, and possible future approaches in Mexico.

How can student assessment, teacher appraisal, school evaluation and system evaluation bring about real gains in performance across a country’s school system? This review report for the Netherlands provides, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the Dutch evaluation and assessment framework in education, current policy initiatives and possible future approaches. This series forms part of the OECD Review on Evaluation and Assessment Frameworks for Improving School Outcomes.

This report on New Zealand provides, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the educational evaluation and assessment framework, current policy initiatives, and possible future approaches.

This book finds that, in many ways, Northern Ireland stands out internationally with its thoughtfully designed evaluation and assessment framework. The major components are well developed, in particular policies for student assessment, school evaluation and school system evaluation. It has been developed using the majority of key design principles recommended by the OECD. The approach to evaluation and assessment combines: central control over policy development and standard setting; transparency over procedures and reporting of results; an increasing responsibility for the implementation of evaluation and assessment among teachers and schools; and central mechanisms to monitor the effectiveness of implementation. For example, while schools and their Boards of Governors are accountable for their educational quality and are accountable to their communities, school development planning processes are also monitored as part of external school evaluation by a central inspectorate. Teachers play a central role in student assessment and their assessment of pupil progress against central standards is moderated by a central agency which engages working teachers in the process. Teachers in primary schools are offered central diagnostic tests to support their assessment of pupil progress. Only teacher appraisal remains entirely school based, but there is a set of common competence standards for teachers.

How can student assessment, teacher appraisal, school evaluation and system evaluation bring about real gains in performance across a country’s school system? This book provides, for Norway, an independent analysis from an international perspective of major issues facing the evaluation and assessment framework in education along with current policy initiatives and possible future approaches. This series forms part of the OECD Review on Evaluation and Assessment Frameworks for Improving School Outcomes

This book provides, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the educational evaluation and assessment framework, current policy initiatives, and possible future approaches in Portugal.

How can student assessment, teacher appraisal, school evaluation and system evaluation bring about real gains in performance across a country’s school system? The country reports in this series provide, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the evaluation and assessment framework, current policy initiatives, and possible future approaches. This series forms part of the OECD Review on Evaluation and Assessment Frameworks for Improving School Outcomes.

How can assessment and evaluation policies work together more effectively to improve student outcomes in primary and secondary schools? The country reports in this series analyse major issues facing evaluation and assessment policy to identify improvements that can be made to enhance the quality, equity and efficiency of school education. Serbia’s education system performs well compared to other countries in the Western Balkans. In recent years, there have been improvements in access to education and Serbia has undertaken major institutional reforms to improve teaching and learning. However, a large share of students in Serbia continue to leave school without mastering basic competencies and efforts to achieve educational excellence continue to be jeopardised by limited institutional capacity and low levels of public spending on education. This review, developed in co-operation with UNICEF, provides Serbia with recommendations to help strengthen its evaluation and assessment system to focus on support for student learning. It will be of interest to Serbia, as well as other countries looking to make more effective use of their evaluation and assessment system to improve quality and equity, and result in better outcomes for all students.

This book provides, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the educational evaluation and assessment framework, current policy initiatives, and possible future approaches in the Slovak Republic.

How can student assessment, teacher appraisal, school evaluation and system evaluation bring about real gains in performance across a country’s school system? This book provides, for Sweden,  an independent analysis from an international perspective of major issues facing the evaluation and assessment framework in education along with current policy initiatives, and possible future approaches. This series forms part of the OECD Review on Evaluation and Assessment Frameworks for Improving School Outcomes.

OECD's comprehensive review of migrant education in Austria. It finds that compared to their native Austrian peers, immigrant students, on average, have weaker education outcomes at all levels of education. Austria has introduced measures to promote equity and support the language development of immigrant students in German and their mother tongues. There is scope to improve the quality of the educational and language support offered in early childhood education and care; strengthen and structure the language support offered in compulsory education; provide diversity training to teachers and school leaders; and reinforce co-operation between schools and immigrant parents and communities. For migrant education policies to be effective and sustainable, it is essential to clarify responsibilities for implementation of national strategies and ensure that the different levels of education co-operate; increase the inclusiveness of the education system by overcoming the early sorting of students; and further develop the culture of evaluation in the education system to monitor student progress.

The immigrant population in Denmark is one of the smallest in Western Europe but is made up of highly diverse groups coming from about 200 different countries. Compared to their native Danish peers, immigrant students, on average, leave compulsory education with significantly weaker performance levels in reading, mathematics and science. Immigrant students are more likely to go to the vocational education and training (VET) sector, which qualifies primarily for access to the labour market. There is scope to develop the capacities of leaders and teachers in schools and VET colleges; build on the existing framework for teaching Danish as a Second Language by standardising structure and mainstreaming the language support offered across all municipalities and school types; involve immigrants’ parents and communities as partners in children’s education; and strengthen monitoring and evaluation at all levels of the system to ensure migrant education policies are implemented and effective.

By international standards, immigrant students in Ireland, on average, perform as well as their native peers at age 15. However, non-English speaking immigrants face particular challenges and do less well. Ireland is undertaking measures with a focus on language support and intercultural education. There is scope to improve access to quality early childhood education and care for all, especially for immigrant children; strengthen learning opportunities for language support teachers; concentrate efforts on mainstreaming language support and intercultural education into regular curriculum, teacher education and research; enhance capacities of teachers and school leaders to be more responsive to the growing linguistic and cultural diversity of students; ensure access to school, home and community liaison services for immigrant families; collect better data to further encourage schools to adopt diversity and inclusive education; and set up a framework for continuous feedback embedded in policy evaluation and school inspection.

International evidence shows marked average performance differences at age 15 between immigrant students and native Dutch students. National evidence reveals that the greatest challenges are for students with non-Western immigrant background. The Netherlands emphasises universal policies to improve education for disadvantaged students, with few policies targeting immigrant students specifically. There is scope to raise the quality of under-performing schools and enhance immigrant families’ means to exercise school choice; strengthen the use of monitoring and evaluation practices within schools; support efforts to promote the enrolment of young children with non-Western immigrant background in high quality preschool and early childhood education; prioritise the recruitment of high quality teachers to schools in disadvantaged areas; prioritise educational and career support to students in vocational programmes; and enhance immigrant parent participation in official school/parent partnerships.

By international standards, Norway has an inclusive education system. However, immigrant students, on average, have weaker education outcomes than their native peers at all levels of education. Norway is undertaking universal and targeted measures to improve the situation of immigrant students. There is scope to improve access to quality early childhood education and care, especially for immigrant children; enhance capacities of teachers and school leaders to be more responsive to the growing linguistic and cultural diversity of students; mainstream language support into curriculum, teacher education and research; provide more support in vocational education programmes such as technical language acquisition and career guidance; compensate for the gaps in learning environments at home through extending school hours, assisting with homework, providing mentors from immigrant backgrounds and supporting migrant parents; manage regional variations by strengthening accountability of schools and promoting knowledge sharing; and monitor progress and use formative evaluation at all levels.

By international standards, Sweden has an inclusive, democratic education system. However, immigrant students, on average, have weaker education outcomes than their native peers at all levels of education. The toughest challenges appear to be access to national programmes and completion in upper secondary education. Sweden is undertaking universal and targeted measures to improve the situation of immigrant students. There is scope to prioritise training of all teachers to be more responsive to the linguistic and cultural diversity of students; provide leadership training for school leaders to implement a “whole-school approach” to migrant education; strengthen induction programmes for the newly arrived students; support capacity building of municipality leaders so they can successfully exercise autonomy and innovation in migrant education in local contexts; prioritise alleviating negative effects of concentration on schooling outcomes with the whole-of government approach; and better use the available data to advance evidence-based policy and practice.