Education is a reflection of society

"The school as we know it today is actually something completely abnormal," says Barbara Schulte, a professor of internationally comparative educational research and dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and Educational Science.

According to Schulte, the modern concept of mass schooling originated in 18-century Europe with the aim to educate a young populace to become loyal citizens, taxpayers and dutiful soldiers. The effects of this history continue to this day in the form of classes, age-based grouping, grades and certificates. 

These structures have become essential characteristics of schools. "Even if you have no idea about the country or culture," Schulte offers an example, "when you walk into a school, you know you are in a school. Yet this is not normal—it is actually something quite extraordinary." 

School as a modern invention

These rigid structures, according to Schulte, have very little to do with the development of children and young people. The central task of the school seems to fulfil a selection mechanism in society, creating the milestones one must accomplish to enter the next stage of schooling or enter the workforce. This historical model, which varied very little across countries, is imposed on everyone, taking little account of the realities of life.

Already in the late 19th and early 20th century, critics could see that children are not learning things that have much to do with life, that exams and subjects have become the focus of attention. Early attempts to make schools more child-friendly resemble the educational reforms of today, e.g., interdisciplinary learning, project-based learning, participatory collaboration with community stakeholders. Yet reforms are persistently met with resistance from the populace. 
 

Comparing school systems across countries

Even though the traditional structure of a school seems rather consistent across countries, the school systems and trends can still differ greatly. Barbara Schulte spent many years in Sweden with her family and visited hundreds of schools in China for her research. Her field of study – international comparative educational research – combines conventional educational sciences with economics, political science and sociology.

"It is generally assumed that we do this kind of research because we want to understand how we can learn from other countries." Yet according to Schulte, this is just a small part of what comparative educational research does. "We're interested in how education is related to different contexts, to different societies and cultures in which we operate. This is the opposite of finding best practices. Many ideas and practices simply can't be adopted. They have to be at least adapted or, in some cases, even discarded."

When should students start to specialize?

As an example, educational studies often look to Northern Europe as role models in education. An important similarity, Schulte notes, is that they have moved away from a differentiated education system to one that is much more comprehensive. 

In Sweden, she explains, there is a longer primary school period where children learn together. They then specialize only in the last three years of upper secondary education. A long period of comprehensive schooling has a significant effect on society: it brings together families and children that would otherwise not have intersected in our stratified, everyday life. In contrast, Austria and Germany famously push students into specialized tracks (mostly) right after the 4^th year of primary school ("Volksschule" in German), when the students have just turned 10. 

The question of when specialization should start is a controversial, polarizing topic. In either case, both early and late specialisation can reinforce inequality. In Austria, early selection means that the outcomes heavily depend on the parents and accessibility to early childhood education. In China, comprehensive schools differ drastically in quality though not by name. Many argue that this kind of freedom leads to greater inequality because much is left to the parents, which is the case in Sweden as well.

Studying for the exam versus project-based learning

Another hot topic concerns subject versus project-based learning. "On the one hand," says Schulte, "we have countries like China where cramming and rote memorisation, or 'binge learning', is very important. On the other hand, in many northern European countries, work is much more project-based, interdisciplinary, without traditional timetables." 

Austria falls in the middle of the spectrum. Even though Schulte's team counted numerous mentions of the term "project" in various curricula, teachers and school administrators have expressed that they cannot afford to spend time on projects at the expense of contents important for exams. 

There are signs that the ‘progressive’ direction of interdisciplinary, project-based learning is waning in some countries. "England is one of the first countries to say, 'we're going back to the basics' to concentrate on key skills in math, science and English," explains the scholar. In Sweden, for instance, the necessity of 'soft skills' and aesthetic subjects are questioned by a now-conservative government. 

The regression, however, is not universal. Finland, for instance, has become self-critical of its traditional system and is thus moving more in the direction of what Sweden used to be. Meanwhile, Norway remains surprisingly consistent. The differences depend on the socio-political situation of each nation.

The struggles of multi-ethnic school systems: insights from China

Schulte did extensive research on the educational system of China, visiting schools in some of the poorest regions, especially in areas with many different ethnic minorities. "We travelled to the Tibetan region of Sichuan Province and Guizhou, where several ethnic minorities come together at one school. That's a completely different school reality than if you were at an elite school in Beijing or Shanghai," she illustrates.

Her observations of education in multiethnic rural areas reveal the complex socio-political issues that impact how students learn. Why are Tibetans losing their culture despite efforts to revive it? The issue goes beyond China as an authoritarian state suppressing cultural aspirations. 

As Schulte explains, academic pressure is extremely high. There are not many respectable vocational paths and the timetable is tight. Unlike Austria and in the Nordic countries, where we have many older students returning to school from their careers, China is much more streamlined. "You really have to make sure that if your goal is university, that you let your child start kindergarten in a way that it all works out in the end." 

Tibetan students must master both Chinese and Tibetan, the latter probably a different kind of Tibetan from the one spoken at home. "And that's actually something extremely difficult to achieve for children growing up in families with no real educational background, and with teachers who aren't even trained for it."

What countries can (still) learn from each other

PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) is an important benchmark for international comparisons. They have led to so-called 'PISA-shock' in countries that were, up to then, confident in their schooling achievements. The most up-to-date survey of 2022 reveals, for example, that Austrian students feel comparatively comfortable in school, but only perform mediocrely in maths, reading and natural science, often motivated by exams rather than genuine interest. 

European countries started to look up to the Nordic countries because of the PISA results, but partly also because they felt they were closer. Even though many Asian countries consistently delivered good results, the general sentiment, according to Schulte, is that the cultural difference felt to be too great for the lessons to apply.

But Schulte states that China had been oriented towards the Western world for a long time, borrowing from Japan, Germany, England, the USA. Now it has the confidence to export its own methods, for instance, Shanghai has been sending math teachers to England. In the process, some Chinese teachers have lamented that "you can't work with these English children at all. They don't make an effort!" Once again, we realise the importance of context. "We can't just transplant a method into another classroom, in a completely different country, on the other side of the world," states Schulte. 

Future outlook: different points of view

In the future, Schulte wishes to return to China and resume her project on ethnic minorities as well as to look into the South-South cooperation in international development and education. 

She is also interested in the comparative experiences that families make when they migrate across educational systems. Drawing from a rich pool of data in Vienna, she would like to ask: What can we learn from the perspectives of the families and how they experience the differences in education systems? 

There is no formula for the best education system, but life- and practice-oriented comparisons are always enriching. 

Listen to the podcast An der Quelle (German) for more interesting conversations around Barbara Schulte's life and experience as a researcher in international spaces.