Quality standards: The definition of repeaters should be unambiguously applied to include even pupils or students repeating more than once in the same grade and those who repeat the same grade while transferring from one school to another. Students who were not studying in the same grade in the previous year should be excluded.
Limitations: The level and maximum number of grade repetitions allowed can in some cases be determined by the educational authorities with the aim of coping with limited grade capacity and increasing the internal efficiency and flow of students. Care should be taken in interpreting this indicator, especially in comparisons between education systems.
Public Expenditure on Education as a Percentage of Gross Domestic Product
Definition: Total public expenditure on education (current and capital) expressed as a percentage of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in a given financial year.
Purpose: This indicator shows the proportion of a country’s domestic production generated during a given financial year that has been spent by government authorities on education.
Calculation method: Divide total public expenditure on education in a given financial year by the GDP of the country for the corresponding year and multiply by 100.
Data required: Total public expenditure on education and the GDP for a given financial year.
Data sources: Data on GDP are normally available from National Accounts reports from the Central Bank.
Type of disaggregation: This indicator is normally calculated at the national level only.
Interpretation: In principle a high percentage of GDP devoted to public expenditure on education denotes a high level of attention given to investment in education by the government; and vice versa.
Quality standards: Total public expenditure on education should include those incurred by all concerned ministries and levels of administration. Total public expenditure on education refers to all expenditure on education by the central or federal government, state governments, provincial or regional administrations and expenditure by municipal and other local authorities. Central government includes ministerial departments, agencies and autonomous institutions which have education responsibilities. The statistics on expenditure should cover transactions made by all departments or services with education responsibility at all decision-making levels. Public expenditure on education as a percentage of GDP generally is below 10%
Limitations: In some instances data on total public expenditure on education refers only to the Ministry of education, excluding other ministries that spend a part of their budget on educational activities.