Source: Times Higher Education via Academica | Sept 10, 2014
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has released its annual “Education at a Glance” report. According to the report, Canada spent 2.8% of its GDP on postsecondary institutions in 2010. This was sufficient to surpass the US as the world leader in this category. Canada was found to have spent twice as much as the OECD average to educate each PSE student. 43% of the cost of PSE in Canada is picked up privately, higher than the OECD average of 31%. The report says that Canada’s colleges have helped the country achieve the highest rate of adult PSE attainment in the developed world. 24% of Canadian adults were found to have graduated from a community college, and 57.3% of Canadians were reported to have achieved postsecondary degrees. Canada’s share of international students increased by about 5% between 2000 and 2012, while the US’s share slipped from 23% to 16%. However, Canada’s math scores—while still higher than the OECD average—have dropped from 2003 levels. Canada is not the only country in which math scores have fallen, with Finland and the Netherlands also seeing reductions.