College Attainment In The U.S. And Around The World
A common talking point in circles in that college attainment in the U.S. used to be among the highest in the world, but is now ranked middling-to-low (the ranking cited is typically around 15th) among OECD nations. As is the case when people cite rankings on the PISA assessment, this is often meant to imply that the U.S. education system is failing and getting worse.*
The latter arguments are of course oversimplifications, given that college attendance and completion are complex phenomena that entail many factors, school and non-school. A full discussion of these issues is beyond the scope of this post – obviously, the causes and “value” of a postsecondary education vary within and between nations, and are subject to all the usual limitations inherent in international comparisons.
That said, let’s just take a very quick. surface-level look at the latest OECD figures for college attainment (“tertiary education,” meaning associate-level, bachelor’s or advanced degree), which have recently been released for 2010.
The graph below presents the nation-by-nation rates for the measure that is most commonly cited – the proportion of 25-34 year olds who have attained tertiary education. This younger age group is usually used for obvious reasons – because most people attend postsecondary schools when they’re younger, the 25-34 estimate best approximates the “current situation.”
Among the 34 OECD nations included in the data, you can see that the U.S. is indeed ranked toward the middle
The latter arguments are of course oversimplifications, given that college attendance and completion are complex phenomena that entail many factors, school and non-school. A full discussion of these issues is beyond the scope of this post – obviously, the causes and “value” of a postsecondary education vary within and between nations, and are subject to all the usual limitations inherent in international comparisons.
That said, let’s just take a very quick. surface-level look at the latest OECD figures for college attainment (“tertiary education,” meaning associate-level, bachelor’s or advanced degree), which have recently been released for 2010.
The graph below presents the nation-by-nation rates for the measure that is most commonly cited – the proportion of 25-34 year olds who have attained tertiary education. This younger age group is usually used for obvious reasons – because most people attend postsecondary schools when they’re younger, the 25-34 estimate best approximates the “current situation.”