The Education and Skills Directorate provides data, policy analysis and advice on education to help individuals and nations to identify and develop the knowledge and skills that generate prosperity and create better jobs and better lives.
Our work focuses on what truly drives high-quality education: identifying where systems excel, where they struggle, and what strategies can enhance outcomes. We provide robust comparative data and policy advice and facilitate cooperation to empower governments to strengthen educational performance, create effective practices, and generate solutions to improve education systems.
Andreas Schleicher
Director
Directorate for Education and Skills
Yuri Belfali
Head
Early Childhood and Schools Division
Paulo Santiago
Head
Policy Advice and Implementation Division
Edmund Misson
Head
Innovation and Measuring Progress Division
The work of the Directorate for Education and Skills is overseen by four bodies, each with its own mandate, membership, and programme of work and budget, to help deliver work under the overall governance of the OECD Council:
We help countries answer important questions facing education policy makers and practitioners alike: how to identify and develop the right skills and turn them into better jobs and better lives; how best to allocate resources in education to support social and economic development; and how to offer everyone the chance to make the most of their abilities at every age and stage of life OECD and partner countries look to our expertise to review their education and skills systems, and assist them in developing and implementing policies to improve them. We conduct reviews ranging from those on individual national education policy to comparative educational policy and thematic peer-analysis. We review and support the development of higher education systems with analysis on resource use and labour market relevance. All of these provide in-depth analyses and advice that draw on OECD data resources, national policy documents and research, and field-based interviewing by OECD review teams. Comparative thematics, covering areas such as ECEC in a digital world, diversity, equity and inclusion in education, teacher policy and transitions in upper secondary education, are based on a common conceptual framework and methodology developed with advice from a group of national experts.
Through tailored implementation support the directorate offers countries assistance in implementing policy, from curriculum reform to helping schools become effective learning organisations. It also brings countries and stakeholders together in a variety of fora to exchange ideas, an important step in the policymaking process.
What knowledge, skills, attitudes and values will students need in a swiftly evolving world? We develop long-term leading-edge thinking that looks beyond the current state of education to what it can become. These multiple-scenario analyses inform international debate and inspire policy processes to shape the future of education.
In staying ahead of the EdTech curve, the directorate advises countries on the fast-changing potential of artificial intelligence and digital tools, and how they can be used to boost teaching, learning and administrative performance. The digitalisation of education is just one of the many strategic foresight areas the OECD’s Centre for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI) focuses on.
Contact us: edu.contact@oecd.org
