Education systems use a range of tools and indicators based on demographic, administrative and contextual data to monitor, evaluate and ensure quality. Data on student learning outcomes are widely available through national standardised assessments. International benchmarking, specific reviews and stakeholder and longitudinal surveys are also increasingly common. Most countries have developed comprehensive national indicator frameworks and report statistics and indicators in annual publications.
Education evaluation and quality assurance
The growing demands for quality and equity in education has led many countries to introduce a range of measures to evaluate students, teachers, school leaders, schools and education systems. These tools are essential to understand how well students are learning and to improve school management, leadership and teaching practices.
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Key messages
Some quality-assurance and improvement arrangements, such as internal evaluations, systematic reporting of data, and written specifications of the school’s curricular profile and educational goals are widely used in almost all education systems. There are however large differences across education systems in the prevalence of other quality-assurance mechanisms. These include seeking written feedback from students, teacher mentoring, and regular consultations with experts.
The heightened emphasis of evaluation and quality assurance in education policy has led to the creation of dedicated agencies, including national monitoring and quality development agencies, national evaluation institutes, specialised research institutes, or regional school review boards. An important aspect for these agencies is to ensure adequate use and interpretation of system evaluation results, including research and the evaluation of educational programmes. This also requires a degree of independence from education authorities to uphold objectivity and credibility.
Context
Three types of school evaluations and improvement actions are widely mandatory
In PISA 2022, three quality assurance and improvement arrangements were mostly reported by school principals: systematic recording of data such as teacher or student attendance, and professional development; systematic recording of students’ test results and graduation rates; internal evaluation/school self-evaluations.
Quality assurance and improvement actions at school (2022)
![Figure: Quality assurance and improvement actions at school (2022)](/https/www.oecd.org/adobe/dynamicmedia/deliver/dm-aid--6559a56c-6fcb-4a55-8359-197d3b68f8ce/figure-quality-assurance-and-improvement-actions-at-school-2023.jpg?quality=80&preferwebp=true)
Quality-assurance mechanisms, autonomy and performance
The top three quality-assurance mechanisms that appear to ensure that greater autonomy is associated with better academic performance in mathematics are: teacher mentoring; monitoring teacher practice by having inspectors observe classes; and systematic recording of students’ test results and graduation rates.
Quality-assurance mechanisms, school autonomy and mathematics performance (2022)
![Figure: Quality-assurance mechanisms, school autonomy and mathematics performance (2022)](/https/www.oecd.org/adobe/dynamicmedia/deliver/dm-aid--2336557c-d1dd-4c88-8080-47d9e6367f14/figure-quality-assurance-mechanisms-school-autonomy-and-mathematics-performance-2023.jpg?quality=80&preferwebp=true)
Related publications
Programmes and projects
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The OECD Indicators of Education Systems (INES) programme seeks to gauge the performance of national education systems through internationally comparable data.Learn more
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PISA is the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment. PISA measures 15-year-olds’ ability to use their reading, mathematics and science knowledge and skills to meet real-life challenges.Learn more
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Artificial Intelligence (AI) and robotics are becoming increasingly sophisticated at replicating human skills. The evolution of these technologies could fundamentally transform work over coming decades and deeply affect education’s current role in providing skills and preparing learners for future work.Learn more
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The Education Policy Outlook is an analytical observatory that monitors the evolution of policy priorities and policy developments from early childhood education to adult education, mainly among OECD education systems, to provide a comparative understanding of how policies are evolving, and how they can be best implemented or improved over time.Learn more
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The OECD’s programme on education and skills policy support policymakers in their efforts to achieve high-quality lifelong learning, which in turn contributes to personal development, sustainable economic growth, and social cohesion.Learn more
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The Higher Education Policy Programme carries out analysis on a wide range of higher education systems and policiesLearn more
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Since 2013, the OECD has gathered evidence on how school resource policies work in different contexts. The focus is now on digital resources to enable countries to learn from each other in the digital transformation of their education.Learn more
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Across the OECD, enormous investment and effort has aimed to reinforce the quality, production and use of education research in policy and practice. Despite this, strengthening the impact of research in education policy making and practice remains a challenge for many systems.Learn more