EUROSTUDENT uses the highest educational degree attained by either of students’ parents, as reported by the students, to classify students according to their educational background (Box 2.1). Financial status of students’ parents
In the EUROSTUDENT VI survey, an item adapted from the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), which was carried out by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA), was used. Students were asked to rate the financial well-being of their parents in comparison to other families using the five categories: (1) not at all well-off, (2) not very well-off, (3) average, (4) somewhat well-off, and (5) very well-off (Caro & Cortes, 2014). Calculating representation indices
As an indicator for the representation of students from different education backgrounds, the actual shares of students from a certain group are set against the share of students from this group in the general population. The index used in this chapter – as in previous rounds of EURO
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STUDENT (Hauschildt, Gwosć, Netz, & Mishra, 2015) – is based on characteristics of students’ fathers, as population statistics needed in the calculations regarding students’ parents as a unit are not available. The index sets the share of students with fathers with a certain education back ground, e.g. without higher education, against the share of 40 – 59 year-old men with the same respective educational attainment in the population. This comparison group is chosen to repre sent the parent generation of students.
Box B2.1
Parental education background in EUROSTUDENT
ISCED 2011 Notes Labour Force Survey EUROSTUDENT
focus groups
ISCED 01: Early childhood educational development
ISCED 02: Pre-primary education
ISCED level 1: Primary education
ISCED level 2: Lower secondary education
ISCED level 3: Upper secondary education
ISCED level 4: Post-secondary non-tertiary education
non-tertiary education
ISCED (0 – 4)
without higher education background
ISCED level 5: Short-cycle tertiary education
Not implemented in all countries.
Not considered to be higher education in all countries. May include vocationally oriented programmes typically not considered to be higher education within a country.
tertiary education (ISCED 5 – 8)
with higher education background
ISCED level 6: Bachelor’s or equivalent level
May include vocationally oriented programmes typically not considered to be higher education within a country.
ISCED level 7: Master’s or equivalent level
ISCED level 8: Doctoral or equivalent level
If the shares are equal, e.g., if the share of 40 – 59 year-olds that attended higher education equals that of the fathers of the students who attained a tertiary degree, the index takes on the value of 1. This value indicates perfect participative equity with regard to the group in question. Values above 1 indicate that students with the education background in question are more common than it would be expected based on the population (overrepresentation), values below 1 indicate underrepresentation.
This index makes cross-country comparisons possible, because it takes into account country specific differences in overall educational attainment. However, it does not take into account the fact that the countries under investigation may be observed at different stages of educational expansion (Blossfeld, P. N., Blossfeld, G. J., & Blossfeld, H.-P., 2015) – the educational opportu nities available to the parent generation may, therefore, be more or less similar to the current student generation in the different countries. A further limitation of the index is that it draws only on potential or hypothetical parents, as more fitting data – shares of young people from specific education backgrounds – are not available for most of the EUROSTUDENT countries. The choice of 40 – 59 year-olds as the parent generation, along with the assumption that adults from all education backgrounds have the same number of children at about the same time in their lives, may not be fully adequate in all countries (see Mühleck, 2013). A further issue not taken into account by the index is the share of international students in the national student popula tions. This may bias the index, depending on the size and composition of the groups of interna tional students.
International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED)
The EUROSTUDENT project makes use of the 2011 revision of the International Standard Clas sification of Education (ISCED) in classifying the educational attainment of students’ parents (UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2012). ISCED is an instrument for compiling and presenting internationally comparable education statistics. The ISCED classifies educational programmes by assigning them to an ISCED level, which indicates the level of education conveyed by the respective programme. The EUROSTUDENT core questionnaire stipulates that parents’ highest educational attainment be classified according to ISCED 2011.
Box B2.1 indicates how ISCED categories were aggregated in the EUROSTUDENT analyses. Detailed information on the exact national qualifications behind each ISCED level can be found in the ISCED mappings: http://uis.unesco.org/en/isced-mappings.
The aggregation applied in EUROSTUDENT into “without higher education background” and “with higher education background”, based on only two categories, absorbs some of the prob lems that have been associated with the comparability of ISCED in the past (Schneider, 2009; Ortmanns & Schneider, 2016). Still, the fact that, in the different EUROSTUDENT countries, qualifications at the same ISCED level may be regarded to be higher education in one country and as vocational training in the other remains1. Differences also exist relating the implementation and status of short-cycle qualifications2 (European Commission/EACEA/Eurydice, 2015) and concerning the coding of parental degrees that are no longer awarded.
1 For example, German Master crafts(wo)men vocational qualifications are at ISCED level 6 (professional) in the qualification framework, i.e. equivalent to the level of higher education. However, these types of degrees are not typically regarded to be part of the higher education system in Germany. Austrian Master crafts(wo)men qualifications, in contrast, are at ISCED level 5 (and are not regarded to be higher education either). 2 For example, in Austria, a qualification attained at a college for higher vocational education (“Berufsbildende Höhere Schulen”) is at ISCED
level 5, but is not typically regarded as higher education in Austria.
In order to enable comparisons with external data sources such as the Labour Force Survey, the ISCED classification has been applied despite these caveats. Some countries, however, may deviate from the focus group definition (Box B2.1).
Data and interpretation
Between a quarter and almost three quarters of students in EUROSTUDENT
countries have parents without tertiary degrees
The parents of higher education students vary greatly with regard to their education across EURO STUDENT countries (Figure B2.1). Between roughly a quarter and almost three quarters of students in EUROSTUDENT countries have parents who did not successfully take part in tertiary education themselves. In around 60 % of EUROSTUDENT countries, students with parents whose highest educational attainment does not exceed upper secondary education are the minority.
Large shares of students with parents who did not attain tertiary degrees can be found in Turkey, Italy, Portugal, Malta, and Poland. In these countries, this applies to 60 % or more of all students.
In Sweden, Latvia, Estonia, Georgia, Germany, Denmark, and Norway, less than 40 % of students have parents who do not hold a tertiary degree.
In the remaining countries, the share of students with parents whose education level does not exceed post-secondary, non-tertiary education lies between 40 % and 60 %.
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Figure B2.1 ä
Educational attainment of students’ parents
Share of students (in %)
% 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 21 31 35 38 40 39 42 39 29 48 36 33 47 49 54 49 54 43 56 58 45 49 58 58 69 73 61 66 6 14 3 3.5 0.2 14 18 12 6 4 5 16 15 6 9 14 12 73 69 65 62 60 59 58 58 57 52 50 49 47 47 46 46 46 45 44 42 40 36 36 33 31 27 25 22 TR IT PT MT PL SK HR RO AL CZ AT SI IS NL HU LT IE RS CH FR SE LV EE GE DE DK NO *
non-tertiary education (ISCED 0–4) short-cycle tertiary education (ISCED 5) tertiary education (ISCED 6–8)
Data source: EUROSTUDENT VI, D.2. No data: FI.
EUROSTUDENT question(s): 6.0 What is the highest level of education your mother/guardian and father/guardian have obtained? [indicated separately] Note(s): Per student, the highest educational attainment of either the father or the mother is counted. “Don’t know” responses were excluded from
calculations.
Deviations from EUROSTUDENT conventions: CH.
Deviations from EUROSTUDENT standard target group: AL, DE, IE, IT, LV, RS.
On average across all countries, students’ mothers’ educational level does not differ from that of students’ fathers, but country specific differences become apparent (Table B2.1). In around half of EUROSTUDENT countries, students’ mothers more often than fathers do not hold a tertiary degree, reflecting the tendency for educational attainment in a couple to be skewed towards the male (van Bavel, 2012). However, in slightly less than half of EUROSTUDENT countries – mainly in Eastern European and Nordic ones – the reverse is true, with higher shares of tertiary attain ment found among students’ mothers, rather than among fathers.
No clear cross-country trend over time is visible with regard to students’ parents’ education
In the 19 EUROSTUDENT countries with available data for both rounds of EUROSTUDENT, no clear pattern of increasing or decreasing shares of students without higher education background emerges.
No or only small changes are found in around half of EUROSTUDENT countries. In the Czech Republic, Switzerland, and Latvia, no change in the shares of students without higher educa tion background has taken place. In Italy, Slovakia, the Netherlands, France, Sweden, and Denmark, a slight decrease (of up to 3 percentage points less) can be found. In Hungary and Estonia, the share of students without higher education background has increased by up to 2 percentage points.
Large decreases in the share of students without higher education background are seen in Malta, Romania, Ireland, and Serbia. Here, the share of these students has decreased by at least 7 percentage points.
Relatively large increases can be found in Poland, Croatia, Slovenia, and Lithuania. At least 5 percentage points more students indicated that their parents do not hold tertiary education degrees in the EUROSTUDENT VI compared with EUROSTUDENT V.
Figure B2.2 ä
Educational attainment of students’ parents – E:V vs. E:VI
69 % 75 100 50 25 0
EUROSTUDENT VI: parents’ highest level of education at ISCED level 0–4
EUROSTUDENT V: parents’ highest level of education at ISCED level 0–4
IT MT PL SK HR RO CZ SI LT HU NL IE RS CH FR SE LV EE DK 62 60 59 58 58 52 49 48 46 46 46 45 44 42 40 36 35 33 25 72 72 53 60 53 68 52 44 49 36 44 48 52 55 42 42 39 35 31 26
Share of students with parents without tertiary degrees (highest degree at ISCED levels 0-4) (in %)
Data source: EUROSTUDENT V/VI, D.2. Data not comparable over time: AT, DE, GE, NO. No data: E:V: AL, IS, PT, TR; E:VI: FI.
EUROSTUDENT question(s): E:V 6.1/E:VI 6.0 What is the highest level of education your mother [E:V: mother/guardian] and father [E:VI: father/
guardian] have obtained? [indicated separately]
Note(s): Per student, the highest educational attainment of either the father or the mother is counted. Deviations from EUROSTUDENT standard target group: E:V: DE, GE, IT. E:VI: AL, DE, IE, IT, LV, RS.
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Figure B2.3 ä
Representation of students with parents not holding a tertiary degree (based on fathers’ educational attainment)
% 100 90 80 70 60 share of students’ fathers
without HE degree 50 (ISCED 0 – 4) 40 30 20 10 DE NO CH IE AT IS LT SI CZ NL SE FR EE FI DK HU LV RO HRSK PT PL IT TR MT
share of men age 40 –59 in population without HE degree 0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100% (ISCED 0 – 4)
Data source: Educational attainment of students’ fathers: E:VI, D.1. Share of men age 40 – 59 in population: EU-LFS 2016 [lfsa_pgaed].
No LFS data: AL, GE, RS.
EUROSTUDENT question(s): 6.0 What is the highest level of education your mother/guardian and father/guardian have obtained? [indicated separately];
”don’t know” responses excluded
Note(s): The graph compares the share of students’ fathers who have not attained tertiary education (ISCED 5 – 8) with the corresponding share of 40 – 59 year-old men in the population. Shares of equal size result in a position on the diagonal (index value = 1). An index value of 1 indicates that there are exactly as many students from non higher education backgrounds as would be expected based on the distribution of educational attain ment in the population. Values over 1 indicate overrepresentation of this group and lie above the diagonal, values below 1 and below the diagonal indicate underrepresentation. Comparisons to LFS data can be influenced by several factors, e.g. the age distribution of students’ parents, reproduc tive patterns, and the share of international students in a country.
Deviations from EUROSTUDENT standard target group: AL, DE, IE, IT, LV, RS.
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Students with fathers without tertiary degrees are underrepresented in almost all EUROSTUDENT countries
On EUROSTUDENT average, only around 80 % of the expected number of students whose fathers’ degree does not exceed ISCED level 0 – 4 are currently enrolled in higher education (Figure B2.3). Students from non-higher education backgrounds (as measured by fathers’ educational attain ment) are relatively well-represented in Italy, Switzerland, Portugal, and Iceland. Here, the share of students in higher education amounts to at least 90 % of what would be expected based on the educational attainment of the fathers’ generation.
In Germany, Norway, Denmark, and Hungary, less than two thirds of the expected share of students with fathers who did not attend tertiary education are currently enrolled in higher education.
Students without higher education background tend to enter higher education later, study in short or first programmes at non-universities, and rely on paid employment to a greater extent than students with a higher education back ground
Students whose parents did not attain tertiary education themselves differ from their peers in several respects (Tables B2.2 and B2.3). The EUROSTUDENT focus group q ‘students without higher education background’ allows investigating the background and study situation of this group.3
3 Note that, depending on the country, students with parents holding higher vocational degrees (at ISCED levels 5 or 6) may be part of this focus group (Box B2.1).
Looking at different demographic groups, students without higher education background are more often found among females in the large majority of countries. Exceptions are Austria, Germany, Denmark, Ireland, the Netherlands, Serbia, and Turkey, in which the difference is very small or non-existent, or, in the case of Turkey, tends towards the reverse. While in almost all countries, larger shares of students without higher education background can be found among domestic vs. international students, no clear pattern can be found with regard to the migration background of this student group. In slightly more than half of all EUROSTUDENT countries, higher shares of native-born students have parents without higher education degrees (Table B2.2). This pattern is reversed in eight countries, with more students without higher education back ground found among domestically educated 2nd generation migrants.
With regard to their entry into higher education, students without higher education background are more often found among students having entered higher education using alternative qentry qualifications than among students having used the standard access route in all countries with available data, except for Albania and Serbia (Table B2.2). Alternative qaccess routes seem to be particularly often used by students without higher education background in Austria, France, Hungary, Iceland, and the Netherlands, where at least 20 percentage points more students without higher education background are found in this group when compared to students with standard access routes. Relatedly, students without higher education background are more often found among qdelayed transition students in all countries (Table B2.2).
As a result of these different transition patterns, qstudents without higher education background are on average 1.7 years older than their peers (Table B1.2). In all but three countries, students without higher education background are most often found among the age group of students who are at least 30 years old (Table B2.2). In Austria, Italy, Malta, Poland, and Portugal, at least three quarters of students older than 30 years have parents who did not attain high education degrees.
Once having entered higher education, the study conditions of students without higher education background often differ from those of their peers (Table B2.3).
Where different types of HEIs exist, students without higher education background are more likely to be studying at qnon-universities than at quniversities in all countries except Albania and France (in the latter case, non-universities refer to the prestigious Grandes Écoles). When comparing short-cycle programmes (where they exist), Bachelor and Master programmes, in all countries except Albania, Croatia, Poland, and Romania, the highest shares of students without higher education background can be found, where they exist, in short-cycle programmes, if these are not a part of the higher education landscape, in BA programmes. In contrast, students without higher education background are less often enrolled in long national degrees, which are often high-prestige fields of study such as medicine or law (Figure B4.3). With regard to their future plans, students without higher education background less often plan to continue with a Master programme after completion of their Bachelor degree (Figure B3.8). The fields of study with the highest share of students from non-tertiary educated families are typically found in education and teaching programmes, as well as in business programmes (Table B4.3).
The living conditions of students without higher education background are often also different. In around 80 % of all EUROSTUDENT countries, the largest share of students without higher education background can be found among those qstudents depending either on public support
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(in slightly more than half of all countries) or on their self-earned income. Accordingly, in all but four countries, their share is higher among qstudents with a paid job of at least 20 hours a week than among non-employed students. Often, this involvement appears to come at a cost with regard to time spent on studies: in more than three quarters of EUROSTUDENT countries, the share of students without higher education background is higher among qlow intensity than among qhigh intensity students (Table B2.3).
Figure B2.4 ä
Students’ assessment of parental financial status
90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0
parents financially not (very/at all) well-off parents financially averagely well-off parents financially (very/somewhat) well-off
TR IE HR DE RO SI SK GE RS PT HU MT EE LT NL AL DK LV PL IS FI SE NO CZ
34 30 29 27 25 24 24 23 22 22 21 20 20 18 17 17 16 16 16 16 16 15 13 10 9 51 45 48 47 56 52 63 40 53 45 45 52 47 46 61 31 36 50 46 41 40 40 38 56 52 15 25 23 27 19 24 13 37 25 33 34 28 33 36 22 52 48 34 38 43 44 45 49 34 39
Share of students (in %)
% 100
Data source: EUROSTUDENT VI, D.3. No data: AT, CH, FR, IT.
EUROSTUDENT question(s): 6.1 How well-off financially do you think are your parents (or guardians) compared with other families? Deviations from EUROSTUDENT standard target group: AL, DE, IE, IT, LV, RS.
Most students come from averagely well-off families
In two thirds of EUROSTUDENT countries, the majority of students, when asked to indicate the qfinancial status of their parents, considers their family to fall into the “average” category (Figure B2.4).
The countries with the highest shares of students with not very or not at all well-off parents are found in Turkey, Ireland, Croatia, Germany, and Romania. Here at least a quarter of students make such an assessment. In Sweden, Norway, and the Czech Republic, on the other hand less than 15 % think this is the case.
The highest shares of students from – by their own assessment – averagely well-off families can be found in Romania, Slovakia, Lithuania, and Norway, where at least 55 % of students agree.
Low shares of students from averagely wealthy families are apparent in the Netherlands, Albania, and Sweden, where less than 40 % give such an assessment. Accordingly, these three countries register the highest shares of students who indicate that their parents are very or somewhat well-off (at least 48 %).
Students’ assessment of parental financial status is related to the parents’ educational attainment (Figure B2.5). On average, across all EUROSTUDENT countries, the share of students who regard their parents to be somewhat or very well-off is 22 percentage points higher among students
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with higher education background than among those without. The share of students indicating that their parents are not at all or not very well-off, in contrast, is on average 15 percentage points lower.
Figure B2.5 ä
Students’ assessment of parental financial status by educational background
Share of students (in %)
a) Students without higher education background
% 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 43 44 13 25 63 12 26 41 33 26 50 24 26 55 19 27 50 23 28 51 21 28 55 17 28 50 22 29 63 8 29 55 16 29 39 32 30 48 22 33 56 11 35 50 15 36 53 11 41 49 10 42 46 12 23 47 30 23 45 32 21 47 32 20 62 18 19 46 35 19 39 42 14 63 23 0 % 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 IE DE TR SI HR RO HU GE RS SK PT DK EE MT LV NL LT FI IS PL NO SE AL CZ
parents financially not (very/at all) well-off parents financially averagely well-off parents financially (very/somewhat) well-off
b) Students with higher education background
IE DE TR SI HR RO HU GE RS SK PT DK EE MT LV NL LT FI IS PL NO SE AL CZ 19 18 15 14 21 14 12 21 17 17 10 12 13 14 9 11 8 10 10 10 8 6 9 11 4 31 40 61 56 45 48 59 50 45 55 43 40 52 63 35 48 44 44 48 44 23 59 37 36 54 33 31 36 34 26 36 34 31 45 39 31 20 55 40 43 42 43 45 69 31 53 54 40 58 58
parents financially not (very/at all) well-off parents financially averagely well-off parents financially (very/somewhat) well-off
Data source: EUROSTUDENT VI, D.3. No data: AT, CH, FR, IT.
EUROSTUDENT question(s): 6.1 How well-off financially do you think are your parents (or guardians) compared with other families? Deviations from EUROSTUDENT standard target group: AL, DE, IE, IT, LV, RS.
Students without higher education background tend to have less clear study intentions and more often doubt their choice