Over 300 million people suffer from depression worldwide. Can education help?

By Simon Normandeau
Statistician, Directorate for Education and Skills

Photo credit: Maksym Kaharlytskyi/Unsplash

The World Health Organization estimates that depression affects over 300 million people worldwide, making it the leading cause of disability. Suffering from depression can make it extremely difficult for an individual to function properly at school and at work; not only does this have an impact on the lives of those affected and their surroundings, but it also has wider economic consequences for societies at large, mainly due to high medical costs and employee productivity loss. In fact, recent studies have found that the total annual costs related to depression exceed EUR 90 billion in Europe, making it one of the most costly mental disorders.

These numbers are calling for action. But can education systems do anything about it? The answer is not so clear cut, but there may be evidence to show that education has at least some part to play in combating depression. The latest Education Indicators in Focus sheds some light on the relationship between education and depression, demonstrating that adults with low educational attainment are often those who report the highest level of depression. However, it is also true that depression among students may in itself be a cause for lower educational attainment, making it impossible to say for sure whether better education results in a lower likelihood of depression.

Even so, this ambiguity should not discourage us: education systems can still play a role in tackling depression and should strive to keep people in education at least until they complete upper secondary education. This means giving appropriate support to low-performing students and ensuring a climate of well-being in the classroom, thus creating an atmosphere that promotes positive attitudes towards mental health and provides all students with the best possible chance to succeed.

Even among similarly-educated adults, the likelihood to report depression varies greatly across countries, and can reflect cultural attitudes towards, and awareness of, mental health issues. The share of low-educated adults who say they suffered from depression is particularly high among low-educated adults in Iceland (above 20%), while it is generally low across different education levels in Italy. The results for Iceland are in line with an OECD report that showed that the country is the largest consumer of antidepressants per capita. The low rates in Italy, on the other hand, might be related to cultural taboos around depression: a recent study found that three quarters of Italians believe that people suffering from depression should avoid talking about their problems.

The differences are not just between countries: gender also plays a significant role in the likelihood to report depression. The chart above shows that, on average, women report higher levels of depression than men, but the likelihood to report depression decreases more steeply as women acquire further qualifications. This decreasing gender gap may be explained by the varying job prospects across different levels of educational attainment: being employed tends to be associated with a lower prevalence of depression, and the gender gap in employment rates also generally decreases as educational attainment increases.

Having a mental illness can also hinder the chances of finding a job; but at the same time, mentally ill people who find employment often show improvement in their condition through a greater sense of worth in the society and through enhanced self-esteem. It is therefore important that education systems ensure a smooth school-to-work transition, especially for those who perform poorly at school as they are likely to suffer from cumulative disadvantages. Students should enter the labour market equipped with the skills to properly flourish and break the vicious cycle that can lead to or sustain depression.

Although awareness of depression goes all the way back to the ancient Greeks and Romans, the illness is still stigmatised in today's world. We now (thankfully) know that depression is not caused by demons and evil spirits, but the reluctance or failure to recognise depression for what it is prevents those most at risk from getting the support they need. Given the extent of the prevalence of depression and the large number of cases not yet diagnosed, it is important to lift the taboos around this illness and get people to talk more about it.

Education systems have a role in identifying those most at risk early on and raising awareness to ensure they are properly supported and that they get the attention they need from teachers or counsellors. It is of course true that schools should be dedicated to raising students' cognitive skills, but they must also equip them with self-confidence and self-esteem – two important factors that can help counter depression.



Read more:

Education in Focus no. 60

Taking a break from the Internet may be good for learning

By Alfonso Echazarra
Analyst, OECD Directorate for Education and Skills

Photo credit: imgix on Unsplash

A Danish study on Internet use at school revealed that students themselves are perfectly aware of the risks of using the Internet for learning. Tellingly, one student explained the problems of using the Internet in the classroom: “You can have a brief conversation on Facebook during a math class and, when you look up again, the blackboard is covered with symbols and numbers”.

While this study also described promising ways in which computers and the Internet were being used in Danish high schools — for instance, students joined study groups on social media — studies like this one remind us how important it is to analyse the challenges associated with the digitalisation of education. After all, governments around the globe are making huge efforts to bring computers and high-speed Internet to every school; but too many questions remain unanswered.

Looking into the Internet use of 15-year-olds, this month’s PISA in Focus tries to answer some of these questions: Are 15-year-olds more connected to the Internet than their counterparts of three years ago? Is the digital divide growing or closing? And do digitally connected students show better education outcomes?

 Greater connectivity may not necessarily be good news for disadvantaged students.

The results show that students around the globe are spending more and more time on line. In the three years from 2012 to 2015, the time that 15-year-olds reported spending on the Internet increased from 21 to 29 hours per week, on average across OECD countries – an increase of more than one hour per day – with most of this increase concentrated on school days. The growth in Internet use was observed in every country and economy that distributed the ICT questionnaire in both the 2012 and 2015 cycles of PISA. Internet use grew the fastest in Chile, Costa Rica, Ireland and Italy, and slowest in Greece, Hong Kong (China), Macao (China) and Slovenia. In Costa Rica, students reported spending, on average, 36 hours per week on the Internet in 2015, compared to 19 hours just three years earlier.

There is no such thing as a digital divide in Internet use in most OECD countries. Even in 2012, socio-economically advantaged and disadvantaged students reported spending a similar amount of time connected to the Internet, on average across OECD countries, presumably because Internet access became virtually universal across most OECD countries in the preceding years. Interestingly, the gap may be reversing in favour of disadvantaged students, on average across OECD countries: in 2015 they reported spending about two hours more per week on line than advantaged students. But in Chile, Costa Rica, Latvia, Mexico, Russia and Uruguay, the traditional digital divide remains: advantaged students reported spending more time connected to the Internet than disadvantaged students – in Mexico, almost 20 hours more per week. And the digital divide persists when it comes to certain online enriching activities, such as reading news on the Internet.

However, this greater connectivity may not necessarily be good news for disadvantaged students. In every school system, students who reported using the Internet more frequently, particularly on school days, scored lower in science than students who reported using the Internet less frequently. These results are not necessarily a call for digital abstinence, but rather a call for moderation, as students who reported using the Internet moderately – up to 30 minutes on a typical weekday at school, between 1 and 4 hours on a typical weekday outside of school or between 2 and 4 hours on a typical weekend day – scored above students who never used the Internet or used it more intensively. Using the Internet intensively is also associated with less satisfaction with life, arriving late for school and lower education expectations, according to the OECD report PISA 2015 Results: Students’ Well-Being.

Students everywhere are spending more and more time connected to the Internet, both in and outside of school, and Internet use among disadvantaged students is increasing exponentially. While this may have been good news a few decades ago, today it may be a mixed blessing: evidence suggests that digitally connected students perform worse academically, particularly when they use the Internet intensively on school days; and extreme Internet users report lower levels of well-being. There are innovative, efficient and promising ways in which digital technologies are being used in education, but until they become the norm, logging off the Internet may not be a bad idea after all.


Learn more:

• PISA in Focus No. 83: How has Internet use changed between 2012 and 2015?

Basic skills: the missing ingredient in England’s apprenticeships

By Malgorzata Kuczera
Analyst, Directorate for Education and Skills

Photo Credit: George Pastushok/Unsplash

Apprenticeships can be of great value. They allow apprentices to develop a wide range of skills, they offer a fast track to employment and they can boost social mobility. But not all apprenticeships are created equal: some provide limited learning opportunities and don’t adequately prepare learners for skilled employment.

So what is the recipe for a good apprenticeship? It includes two essential ingredients: education and training, provided both on and off the job. As with any recipe, results depend on the quality of the ingredients and the way in which they are mixed together. And as any great chef will tell you, the recipe only improves with repetition and continuous refinement.

England is investing more in the development of its apprenticeship system than nearly any other country. Current reforms have created a new structure for apprenticeship programmes developed by employer groups and funded by a new levy on all large employers. Much has been achieved so far, as described in Apprenticeship in England, a new OECD study that compares England’s recent reforms with practices in other countries. Here, though, we’ll focus on a key ingredient in the English recipe that demands closer attention: basic skills.

English apprentices have distinctive characteristics. In some countries, like Switzerland, nearly all apprentices are teenagers. In Canada and other countries, nearly all apprentices are young adults, with an average age of around 30. In England, apprentices are a mixed group, with a fairly even split between learners above and below the age of 24.

Share of 25-year-olds and older among current apprentices (2012)

For young people, an apprenticeship can act as a launch pad into a successful working life, though that cannot be guaranteed. A 2016 OECD study of basic skills in England, Building Skills for All, showed that one-third of 16- to 19-year-olds in England have weak basic skills, compared with about 20% in Germany and 10% in the Netherlands. This means that a high proportion of young English men and women have real difficulties with literacy and numeracy – the foundations upon which continued learning is built. In working environments where tasks and even whole occupations are at risk of radical change, such foundational skills have become increasingly important.

Young English apprentices receive far less general education than apprentices in other countries. In England, general education (including maths and English) adds up to between about 50 and 100 hours over the duration of an apprenticeship; and it is only mandatory for those not meeting the requirements in English or maths. German and Swiss youth apprenticeships, by comparison, require around 400 hours of general education covering a range of subjects. Norwegian apprenticeships require nearly 600 hours of general education.

The remedy, as described in the OECD's new report, is for England to include more general education in youth apprenticeships – though doing so is not exactly straightforward.  Increased general education will demand more time from apprentices, taking them away from the workplace. This is unlikely to be popular with employers. It may also require a differentiated approach to adult and youth apprentices who may be less in need of initial basic education. And of course, additional teaching will involve more human and financial resources.

These are major challenges, but if England wants to develop a world-class apprenticeship system, they need to be overcome.




Learn more:

• Apprenticeship in England
• Building skills for all: a review of in England
• A Skills beyond School Review of England
• Work-based learning for youth at risk: getting employers on board
• Incentives for apprenticeships
• Work, train, win: work-based learning design and management for productivity gains

Why pedagogy matters for innovative teaching

By Alejandro Paniagua
Consultant, Directorate for Education and Skills

Photo credit: Celia Ortega/Unsplash

It is generally acknowledged that the quality of an educational system depends upon the quality of its teachers. Teachers are responsible for preparing young people to meet new challenges in a fast-changing world; and that is why innovation in teaching practices has become essential for engaging students.

When it comes to innovative practice, there are many documented examples of innovative practice that teachers can turn to; however, to simply direct teachers to a set of tools and techniques would not necessarily be the best way to help them innovate in the classroom. Every situation is unique, and it is not always clear how such tools can be adapted in practice.

A new OECD report, Teachers as Designers of Learning Environments: the Importance of Innovative Pedagogies, takes a different approach. Rather than viewing teachers as technicians who adopt tools to improve the learning outcomes of their students, the report sees them as competent professionals who are able to find solutions to new problems. If the main challenge in educational practice is to meet the diverse needs of every student, then teaching needs to be acknowledged as a problem-solving process rooted in teacher professionalism.

Innovation in the classroom isn’t fostered by feeding teachers with techniques.

Our report focuses on pedagogies around natural learning inclinations, such as play, emotions, creativity, collaboration and enquiry. By identifying and grouping innovative approaches that promote learner engagement and align with new principles of learning, this publication can help teachers to innovate for themselves. It also provides readers with valuable insights from networks of innovative schools, including some that have already implemented the approaches described in the report.

In writing this report, we built on the analysis of six “clusters” of innovative pedagogies:

• blended learning, where the classroom is seen as the place to apply content and deepen one-to-one interactions, whether with the teacher or through peer collaboration; 

• gamification, which is engagement through play and the pedagogies of games; 

• computational thinking, which addresses mathematics as a coding language and looks at information and communication technology (ICT) as a platform for developing problem-solving reasoning in students;

• experiential learning, which focuses on the process of discovery;

• embodied learning, which focuses on the non-mental factors involved in learning and that signal the importance of the body and feelings; and 

• multiliteracies and discussion-based teaching, which situates knowledge in the political and cultural context. 

Together, these clusters provide a baseline from which teachers can innovate themselves.

It is essential for teachers to understand the relationship between teaching and learning when designing learning environments; and to acknowledge the importance of networking and collaboration among schools that are implementing similar approaches – this is the starting point for putting innovations into action.

In the case of ICT, the increased use of computers in different subjects has not signalled a turning point in how students acquire the complex set of skills they need to be proficient. They may become familiar with basic tasks, but not in a way that boosts their learning or, more importantly, helps them understand ICT as a critical tool for solving today’s challenges.

In fact, the unfulfilled promise of ICT in education underscores the importance of putting pedagogies at the centre of education policy discussions. The importance of ICT and skills like critical thinking and digital literacy has come into clearer focus in new projects targeting curriculum reform, and it has been incorporated in surveys such as the Programme for International Students Assessment (PISA). Yet neither the curriculum nor the assessments really tell teachers how to update their practices.

School networks are critical for understanding and scaling classroom-level innovations.

To help teachers become champions of ICT in the classroom, we must think in terms of teaching and learning interactions. For example, by considering critical thinking, digital literacy or computer science in terms of pedagogies, it is possible to identify computational thinking as a key pedagogical lever in understanding how to use computers in the way that scientists do to solve problems – in other words, using computers to implement problem-solving approaches. This, in turn, can improve student competence in mathematics, sciences, or other key areas such as design or algorithmic thinking.

School networks are also a critical lever for understanding and scaling classroom-level innovations. Such networks play an important role in encouraging innovation as a community-driven process to collectively improve the design of learning environments.  Computers at School (CAS), a grassroots organisation that supports computer science teaching in schools across the United Kingdom, focuses much of its support on computer science subject knowledge. Such support also serves as a platform upon which new pedagogies, such as computational thinking, can flourish.

Recognising the key role of pedagogy is not about policy dictating the best teaching methods. Rather, it is a matter of broadening teachers’ skills and techniques, and helping them explore new ways of thinking, reflecting and understanding. In this mission, teachers are not and should not be alone: teachers in school networks are in continuous contact with a large community that supports their professional development. Innovation in the classroom isn’t fostered by feeding teachers with techniques, but through a learning process in which teachers identify their creative, intuitive and personal capacities, and better align them with innovative pedagogies.



Read more: 

• Teachers as Designers of Learning Environments: the Importance of Innovative Pedagogies
• Understanding Innovative Pedagogies: Key Themes to Analyse New Approaches to Teaching and Learning
• Teaching in Focus No. 21 - What does innovation in pedagogy look like?