The obligatory age of entering structured education varies worldwide. Nevertheless, the ever-more common practice of introducing children to pre-primary education increases their chances to become successful students in their later school years. Over 67% of children all around the world enter structured education a year prior to reaching the obligatory schooling age by them. Pre-primary education is most common in Latin America and Europe, where over 94% of children attend pre-primary institutions, whereas Africa and Central and Western Asia are the regions with worst conditions for pre-primary education for the youngest. Only less than half of them receive structured education a year prior to reaching the compulsory-schooling age. However, in all regions of the world early education is more common nowadays than it was several years ago. The scope of this type of schooling has increased most considerably (i.e. by 16-25 percentage points since 2005) in: Northern Africa, where presently 54% of children attend institutions offering pre-primary education, Oceania (where 80% of children do so), and South-Eastern Asia (where 91% of children receive pre-primary education).

Intensive development of information and communication technologies as well as increased mobility makes it easier to take advantage of the best available educational opportunities. Since 2005, a significant increase (from 24% to 38%) in the number of young people pursuing higher education has been observed all over the world. Universal access to higher education has widened considerably (by 20-30 percentage points) in countries of Western Asia (where 56% of young people attend higher education institutions), Eastern and South-Eastern Asia (45%) and Latin America (52%). In many regions of the world, however, the ability to pursue tertiary education is still largely dependent on the financial situation of the student’s family. Young people of sub-Saharan Africa have the most limited access to tertiary education, as a consequence of which only 9% of them pursue such education.

Participation rate in organized learning (one year before the official primary entry age) (%)

Children in Poland begin their compulsory education with an obligatory one-year primary preparation. In 2016, the pre-primary compulsory schooling age was set at 6, while all 4- and 5-year-olds since then (and 3-year-olds since 2017) have been entitled to a place in a state-owned nursery school. The related legal regulations jointly with the growing number of educational institutions and the steady fall in the number of schooling-age children have all been contributing to the gradual increase of the scope of publicly-accessible pre-primary education. At present, 93% of children over the age of 4 attend pre-primary institutions (compared to 76% in 2010), which is slightly less than the EU average. A considerable growth has been observed in the number of the youngest children entitled to nursery education (i.e. 3-year-olds) participating in this type of education. To sum up, presently 88% of children below the compulsory schooling age participate in the early education and care (compared to 76% in 2013). This is still less than the EU average, however, where 93% of children above the age of 3 receive regular pre-primary education.

Percentage of children aged 4 and over in early childhood education (%)

The results of the international PISA test, conducted by OECD, illustrate the level and diversification of students’ skills. Polish 15-year-olds are among the world’s best students in terms of reading comprehension and mathematical reasoning. In both of these areas Poland ranked 10th among nearly 80 countries participating in the 2018 edition of the survey. Polish students’ scores are even higher than that when compared to scores of EU students only. In such a ranking, Polish students are 4th in reading comprehension and 3rd in mathematics. Polish students’ results have improved over recent years, and are currently more uniform across all the tested skills (as opposed to results of students from many other countries, where significant differences between the level of mastering different skills can be observed). Fewer Polish students than in previous years achieved minimum or below-minimum results in reading comprehension and mathematics (less than 15%, compared to the EU average of over 20%). In Poland, as in the majority of other tested countries, girls achieve better results than boys in reading comprehension. Polish girls and boys, however, receive similar average scores in mathematics, while in most world and EU countries boys tend to obtain better results in this field than girls.

Students achieving results below expectations (below level 2) in PISA tests in 2018 (%)

Young Poles relatively rarely discontinue their education at an early stage. Among 18-24 year-olds, 5% finish their education at lower secondary level. Half of this group work, while most of the remaining half have no intention to undertake any employment. The percentage of those leaving education early has remained stable for several years in Poland and is among the lowest in the EU. In Poland, as in the case of most EU countries, this problem concerns boys to a greater degree than girls. They discontinue their education twice as often as girls (7% compared to nearly 4%, respectively).

Early leavers (aged 18-24) from education and training (%)