EDUCATION INDICATORS FOCUS

What are tertiary students choosing to study? The social sciences are the most popular field for non-vocational tertiary education programmes. One in three new students choose a programme in social sciences, business and law. Gender equality has been virtually achieved in many fields of study, especially in social sciences and services but significant gender differences persist in computing and engineering (male-dominated) and in health and welfare and education (female-dominated). Almost one in four international students in OECD countries follow programmes in the field of business and administration (23%). The proportion of international students from fields oriented to the public function such as education (3%) or health and welfare (9%) is lower on average. ISCED Classification The International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics categorises fields of study in order to facilitate comparisons of education statistics and indicators on the basis of uniform and internationally agreed definitions. This classification comprises 25 narrow fields of education organised in 9 broad groups. General programmes (0) are not included in this analysis as these programmes are usually found at the lower levels of education. Please note that “social sciences ” refers to the broad field (3) and not to the narrow field “social and behavioural sciences”. ”Science-related fields ” here include both science (4) and engineering, manufacturing and construction (5) together