Foreword

The German-speaking Community of Belgium is in the process of developing an overall vision for its education system (the Gesamtvision Bildung), which aims to guide reforms to promote greater educational quality and equity. Following a first phase of the process, which consisted of a bottom-up diagnosis based on stakeholder perspectives, the OECD was invited to complement these insights with an international perspective on the German-speaking Community’s school system. This Education Policy Review aims to support the development of the Gesamtvision Bildung by providing an independent analysis of the effectiveness, efficiency and equity of the Community’s education system.

This report presents the findings and recommendations emerging from the review, which was carried out as part of the OECD’s Reviews of National Policies for Education, undertaken by the Policy Advice and Implementation Division within the Directorate for Education and Skills, with the support of an external expert. The review process involved the preparation of a background report by the German-speaking Community and a two-week virtual visit to conduct interviews with a wide range of experts and stakeholders. The review covers pre-primary to upper secondary education and focuses its analysis on the system’s policies and performance in international comparison (Chapter 1), the funding and governance of school education (Chapter 2), policies to support equity and inclusion (Chapter 3), school improvement, leadership and the development of the teaching profession (Chapter 4).

The report highlights the strengths of the German-speaking Community’s school system while also identifying some key challenges that the Community will need to address in order to formulate and successfully implement an ambitious overall vision. Building on the analysis, the report proposes several options for future reforms, which highlight opportunities to build on the system’s strengths in order to enhance the effectiveness of its resource use and ensure that the system delivers the best outcomes for all students. The OECD review team hopes that the analysis in this report captures the system’s many strengths and supports public authorities and stakeholders over the coming years in developing and implementing an ambitious overall vision that will further improve the effectiveness, efficiency and equity of education in the German-speaking Community.