Substudy 9: Education and Training as a Prerequisite for Innovation

The graduation level is crucial in determining an individual's opportunities in terms of job and income, as well as their social status and life expectancy. A modern education system should be directed at ensuring equal opportunities and enabling social mobility. The Austrian education system, however, is characterised by its strong differentiation by social origin. Social selection through access to education is particularly hard on children from low-education strata and those with a migrant background. This can be counteracted by measures in the field of primary education which, for one, alleviate social selection and, secondly, support the integration of people with a non-German mother tongue. In addition, the study presents proposals to raise the ratio of individuals that have passed an upper-level secondary school. With regard to further education, the measures proposed aim at improving access to and raising participation in life-long learning.