World Bank Group Education Global Practice  righter Futures Smarter Education Systems for B SABER Tertiary Education 2016 Tertiary education systems play a critical role in creating the knowledge and human resources needed for global competitiveness, economic growth, and poverty alleviation. Despite rapid global growth in tertiary education, many important challenges remain— in areas such as expanding access, promoting equity, improving learning achievement, strengthening knowledge generation and technology transfer, and encouraging desired values, behaviors, and attitudes among students. SABER-Tertiary Education offers a conceptual framework and benchmarking tool to help countries meet these challenges by evaluating the appropriateness of their policies. Why do countries invest many challenges remain, at the tertiary level are of two in tertiary education? including expanding and kinds, financial and nonfinancial. promoting equitable access, The latter include inadequate Tertiary education refers to improving learning achievement, information, motivation, all postsecondary education, fostering educational quality academic preparation and social including but not limited to for relevance, strengthening capital. Progress in tertiary universities. In recent years a knowledge generation and education has been uneven, diverse and growing network technology transfer, and and sharp contrasts remain of public and private tertiary encouraging desired values, between and within tertiary institutions in every country— behaviors, and attitudes, among education systems worldwide. universities, colleges, technical others. Tertiary education Although the economic returns training institutes, community systems in many countries are on education for graduates of colleges, nursing schools, plagued with high drop-out and tertiary institutions are high, research laboratories, centers non-completion rates. Despite in several countries they have of excellence, distance learning extensive efforts to improve been gradually declining as a centers, and many more—have tertiary education opportunities greater base of graduates joins all helped prepare students to worldwide, access to this level of the labor market, and concerns apply knowledge at an advanced education and success within it about the relevance of their skills level. Good quality institutions, are highly inequitable. Inequality persist. In addition, technological diversified options, and relevant, in tertiary education is, to a large advances and the shift towards equitable, and efficient tertiary extent, an extension of inequality a global service economy are education and research are key at lower levels of education, changing job profiles and skills. to ending extreme poverty and and a reflection of system-wide The stunning rise of the middle- advancing economic growth.  structural barriers impacting income countries has intensified the economic and social the desire of many nations to What challenges exist? opportunities of many talented increase their competitiveness Despite rapid growth in tertiary and capable young people. by building more highly skilled education around the world, The main additional barriers workforces. The result is an worldbank.org/education | saber.worldbank.org | @wbg_education intense demand for expanded with a stake in educational ■■ Relevance of tertiary access to tertiary education results—from students, education for economic and, in particular, to technical administrators, teachers, and development and vocational education parents to policymakers and and training (TVET) that can business people—an accessible, How will SABER-Tertiary provide students with skills and detailed, objective snapshot of Education help to knowledge relevant to labor how well the policies of their improve education market needs. country’s education system are systems? oriented toward ensuring that all What is SABER-Tertiary children and youth learn. The SABER-Tertiary Education Education? policy framework can help SABER-Tertiary Education improve education systems by: Using new diagnostic tools and collects, synthesizes, and detailed policy information, the ■■ Strengthening tertiary disseminates comprehensive World Bank Group’s Systems education systems at the information on tertiary education Approach for Better Education country level, rather than just to enable policymakers and Results (SABER) platform collects individual post-secondary development partners to learn and analyzes comparative data institutions. Past attempts to how countries address similar and knowledge on education measure and analyze what policy challenges, and to track systems around the world and works in tertiary education differences among countries in highlights the policies and have emphasized the results terms of needs, policies, and institutions that matter most to of individual institutions, practices. promote learning for all children but there have been limited and youth. SABER’s detailed What drives effective efforts to analyze the tertiary data-gathering and analysis are tertiary education? education policies and organized by “domains,” or programs at the country level. areas of education policymaking Based on extensive research and global evidence on ■■ Enabling countries to draw on within an education system. high-performing and rapidly the framework paper for an These currently include levels improving systems, a toolkit for evidence-based global review of education (early childhood assessment is currently under of what specific policies development, primary development and will include matter most. and secondary, workforce development, and tertiary), benchmarking of policies in ■■ Enabling cross-country types of quality resources and the following tertiary education learning and fostering supports (school finance, school components: informed dialogue and health and school feeding, and decision-making using a ■■ Vision for tertiary education teachers), areas of governance structured framework and (engaging the private sector ■■ Regulatory framework for methodology. and school autonomy and tertiary education ■■ Involving key system accountability), information ■■ Governance of a tertiary leaders and stakeholders in sources (education management education system and its identifying reform priorities, information systems and student institutions leading to education policy assessment), and complementary Financing of tertiary ■■ reform and new program inputs and cross-cutting education initiatives in several countries. themes (equity and inclusion, information and communication ■■ Quality in tertiary education ■■ Enhancing the global technologies, and resilience). ■■ Equitable access, retention, knowledge base on effective SABER aims to give all parties and successful completion tertiary education policies. worldbank.org/education | saber.worldbank.org | @wbg_education