The Secrets of Estonia's Education Success - A Conversation with Mart Laidmets

Welcome to the Future Learning Design Podcast.

There are a lot of actually questions which you can solve on the spot, on the local government level, and more autonomy and resources you give to those actors which are actually deciding and which are closest to students, then, then better. And that's, I think, should be learned everywhere.

Hi everybody, thanks for joining me again for another episode of the Future Learning Design podcast.

This week I went on a mission to find out the secrets of success in Estonia's education system by speaking with Mr. Mart Leidmits. Mart is the General Director of Education and Youth Board of the Republic of Estonia. Previously, from January 2019 until August 2021, he held the position of the Secretary General of the Ministry of Education and Research of the Republic of Estonia. Where he was responsible for directing the work of Deputy Secretary Generals and Departments of the Ministry, as well as coordinating the work of state institutions and government bodies under the Ministry's sphere of administration. In addition to this, Mr. Leidmetz has been a board member of the Foundation Innov and has been working for the non-profit association Universities Estonia, as well as the University of Tartu. He has been a researcher at the Uppsala University, advisor to the Chancellery of the Rikikogu , and an advisor to the Prime Minister of Estonia. You can follow Mr. Leidmitz on LinkedIn as well as follow the Education and Youth Board of Estonia on Twitter @Hanno_EE.

Good morning.

Good morning, Mr. Mard. How are you?

I'm fine.

Good.

Well, welcome.

Thank you for joining me. I'm very happy to be speaking with you for the Future Learning Design Podcast this morning. And obviously there's been a lot of talk in the education world about the success of Finland as a kind of trophy country, but a bit less talked about Estonia. And that's one of the reasons why, but given the success that we've seen in, in the PISA results and the quite interesting and amazing things you're doing there in Estonia, I was very interested to talk with you as somebody responsible for the education in Estonia, just perhaps if we could have a bit of a general discussion about some of the things that you're doing, some of the secrets of your success, perhaps? Where do you feel— I've seen that equity and teacher autonomy are quite big emphases in the system there, but where would you see that some of the secrets of the success there have been?

Yes, good morning. As you mentioned yourself, I think what's most important is equal access to education, because in Estonia it doesn't matter if you are living in a big city or in rural areas, basically Central government tries to guarantee the same quality education, at least on a basic education level, first 9 classes everywhere. And of course, or it's connected to the teacher profession, but we have well-educated master-level professionals as teachers everywhere. And of course, we hope that we can raise the salary level faster than we have done it before. But anyway, even the salary level is also rising, and that's where— that is attracting a little bit more young people also to the teacher profession. So teachers and equal access are the main pillars. And of course, the interest of parents also, that they are really engaged in the future of their children, and they understand that education is very, very important to be successful in your life.

Yeah, very good. It definitely seemed to be coming through in the data that I've seen, that the— talking about equity, firstly, that you have achieved very small gaps between the richest and the poorest students, which is no mean feat, I think, in, you know, compared to many other countries with very large differences in terms of educational outcomes. Would you say that was part of some of the inheritance of the system as it was in the Soviet era?

No, I wouldn't say, because even during Soviet time As strange as it might be, everybody is thinking about the Soviet Union as a very centralized country and everything ruled under the same conditions everywhere. But as it matters to education, the education systems were different in different Soviet republics. And even the language in which the education was conducted was different. So it was in Estonia, it was in Estonian, of course Russian also in Russian-speaking schools. But even the national curriculum was still Estonian. And I think it actually has roots in pre-second education system as in Finland. And even in both cases, it's even a longer history. Even during the Swedish kings who were actually starting the education system and compulsory education for everybody, for every boy and girl here already in the 17th century. So it has its roots, but it doesn't mean that it would be possible to introduce anywhere else. But of course, we have a strong feeling that everybody should learn already, almost at least basic skills like reading, maths, and languages. It has always been important. Just the basic skills have been, of course, changing during the times.

And what is it in terms of practically this with the network of schools you have there? Is there an active private sector or is it predominantly government-run public schools?

Most of the public schools are run by local governments, but we have approximately 10% private schools also. They are funded also by the central government, but they can take some tuition fee also, which is not very high to get this support from the government, because there should also be equal access. On the other hand, they are helping to make education system more diverse. There are religious schools, different approaches to education, and that's all allowed. But then you should also make it possible to attend extend the possibilities even for people with lower socioeconomics.

Yeah, and from my research I also understood that there's quite a high degree of autonomy. As you say, the public schools are locally run or by local government, and there's a relatively high degree of autonomy for those schools.

Is that correct? Absolutely. With teachers, the headmasters who are quite autonomous, they know goals which have to be reached, and we have national tests even in basic school and in the end of upper secondary education, and of course Even too much attention is paid sometimes to those rankings, in which place you are. But on the other hand, of course, it's very important for everybody in the, in the system. And, but we don't say from the ministry, but how you have to achieve those. You can choose your study materials, you can choose teachers, you can choose almost everything as much as long as it's corresponding to a national curriculum.

Very good. And again, the data from the teacher satisfaction from PISA seem to be increasing. As you said, you've managed to increase the social value placed on the teaching profession in Estonia, and that seems to be playing out in the teacher satisfaction surveys, that they're perceiving a significant increase in the value that their role is placed in society.

Yeah, absolutely. And we were quite successful pre this COVID crisis. Of course, the COVID crisis has changed the picture a little bit because of course it's not only about health crisis, economic crisis also behind that, so we can't raise salaries as it was planned and so on. But then of course there is much more pressure on teachers this time of digital or distance learning, which of course helps a lot with this digital revolution, but on the other hand makes it much more complicated to change it so rapidly as we have seen. So yeah, but still, as we can see from the last data from universities, that the interest to become teacher is is growing still. Good.

And so you've had the 2020 Lifelong Learning strategy that you've been working towards, and that has now been, as I understand it, has been renewed for the 2035 strategy. So how are you— how would you evaluate your progress against those, and then looking forward to the 2035 Smart and Active strategy?

Yes, we were— I think we were quite successful in implementing Previous strategy, one of pillars was this focus on digital lifelong learning, and of course in a way this COVID crisis helped us to implement it much faster. But for the next period, yes, for the next 15 years, we are talking, yes, much more about this personalized education. How technology could help more in the field of education, because we are still using all those digital materials, digital textbooks, programs, comes in quite old-fashioned way. What we could see also during this COVID crisis, that this feedback which teachers are giving to students are still the same as it would be in a normal classroom. So we are not using artificial intelligence or anything else so much yet. But there are huge possibilities, and of course there are also some threats about, of course, data issues, all kind of issues. Yeah, but, but if you don't try, then you will not move forward.

That's, you know, absolutely. Some, some experimentation needs to happen for sure. That was one of the things I wanted to ask you about was the digital innovation, because I've, I've even seen, again, as I understand it, the uptake of digital innovation across a lot of Estonian society, not just in education, has been quite rapid and quite significant. Even I saw somebody calling it Eastonia. How would you say, obviously you've said already something there about some of the challenges, but where have been the positives in terms of the way that the digital innovation has been taken up in the education system there?

Yes, it's sometimes difficult to understand how digital world is actually integrated into Estonian society. Because already from the beginning of '90s it was quite clear and conscious decision that we will just not take over all the Western technology, which was not possible or available in the Soviet Union, but we take next step ahead and then try to really become digital society. And thanks to this infrastructure we have created right now, of course education system is also part of it, so We can use all those national registries, all the data is available for everybody. And of course it means that people have to trust also the central government and all those databases which are using actually this data so much. Because of course during the cyber attacks and everything else what's happening, it's dangerous. But yeah, almost all the society is digital and of course even education system. Maybe education system less than society in general because 99% of public services are available digitally because every Estonian has not only physical identity but even digital identity during those— your ID card, so you can use and sign all the documents and even get almost married digitally if you want. But in education system, there is so much where actually teacher need to see with students, and it's not possible to do it only digitally. All we have, all those platforms have materials, but I think we are still helping teachers and students to study better, and in that way we could still move ahead with using all those possibilities even more. But yes, actually what is important in our case, that we are not considering ICT as something specific or digital competencies. Already 2014, in Estonian national curriculum was introduced teaching competencies as one of the generic competencies, like behaving good and so on. So actually you should anyway, to, to manage in Estonian society, you should have those skills and knowledge how to survive in digital surroundings.

And is that, is that what's driving then the, in the Smart and Active strategy, more of a focus on personalized learning? What is the driver for that policy shift?

Yes, and of course this personalized learning means that if we would like to introduce this personalized learning to you in this system we have right now, it would be quite impossible because we don't have so much teachers that you could have a very personal approach. But if we are thinking of this personal education as a lifelong learning process, and you can choose yourself and you want to study something and you have some probably digital courses and you can build your own way how to get some qualifications. And then, and now question, how do you collect all this into one formula so you can actually get accepted at all? So, so my next steps are, yeah, really using the technology for more personalized approach. But as I said, there are issues with data protection and other challenges, but, but we are trying to find the ways out.

Yeah. And it seemed to be so in some of the OECD feedback, just looking at the country profile there, the skill development of young people and then into higher education to provide the skills that the innovation in the economy is demanding. That was something that seemed to be an area for development for the country. Is that also then feeding also into vocational and skills-based technical education and higher education as well?

Yes, of course. What we have seen in our society is one of the challenges, but as strange as it is, the public sector is digitally very advanced. But there are some sectors which are not so advanced yet, which are using quite old-fashioned technology still. And then there is a question how to actually— it can easily happen that at Vocational Education Institution you prepare very well-trained advanced students, but when they go to a company, they face technology which is from the 1970s or '80s. So we almost can't use it or we don't know how to use it. And of course then it doesn't work. So it's our— or vice versa, could it also be that the education system is more ahead or advanced than employers? But of course in many ways the changes are happening quite generally fast there also, and our problem is, or our task is of course to prepare young people to really tackle the problems of the 21st century. So you can't prepare people for knowledge which was used 20 or 30 years ago.

And the experience for young people, do most of them graduate from high school and stay in tertiary education, higher education in Estonia, or are most of them outside of Estonia for that?

Most of them are still staying in Estonia. Approximately 75% go to higher education, and then mostly in Estonian schools, at least at bachelor level. But on master level, there is of course much more exchange and, and more possibilities to find ways. And of course, we are getting in many international students also, almost, I think, 10%. And then they are studying ICT, which is of course quite obvious. They are doing and staying in Estonia to involve our unicorns or our edtech companies.

Very good. And the research seemed also to be a strong area from my reading that in the universities that was another attractive, you know, bringing people in, but also a strength within the country in higher education.

Yes, of course. It's not only the PISA tests and strong basic education, but even research and higher education are on a high quality level, best in our region at least. So yeah. So it's attracting both students and professors here.

And is that feeding down into then the, you know, junior and high school education as well in terms of the application of research into developing, you know, more innovative teaching and learning or more effective teaching and learning?

Yes, of course. We have two centers of competence already, both in Tartu and in Tallinn, the biggest universities which are working on it, and they are quite good job.

Yeah, very good. It's interesting, isn't it, because everybody knows about Finland, but that's one of my, my aims for this podcast is to, to spread the word of the good things happening in Estonia because it seems that there's a lot, a lot of good things going on there but not quite as well known as the success story. Why do you think that is?

Yeah, I think Finland has a longer tradition already and promoting also their education system, and we are doing very close cooperation actually Finland because we are neighbors and our language is quite similar. So we are considered as, I don't know, two brothers and sisters or brother and sister or something like that. But of course we had also plans promoting more what we have achieved and how we have achieved. But during this COVID crisis, it was in a way much more easier because we could attend all those virtual conferences. But in the end, of course, people, I think, got tired of it. And we are of course telling, because I think personally, but when we're talking about PISA tests and so on, there are many countries which say that, oh, you are so small in Finland and Estonia, and you can manage very, very well with your education system. You can do the changes, whatever you need, very fast. But I don't think so, because every big system consists also of quite small parts. And so you can start anyway somewhere if you want to really achieve equal access or We value teachers more. And there are a lot of questions which you can solve on the spot, on the local government level. And more autonomy and resources you give to those actors which are actually deciding and which are closest to the students, then better. And that's, I think, should be learned everywhere. I think it's both Finnish and the Estonian approach. It's not only Estonian.

No, I would agree, and that's an interesting point actually, because I think I was speaking with Olli-Pekka Heinonen from Finland, who's now with the IB, and we were talking about, again, as you say, the similarities in terms of particularly with autonomy, and that question of affecting change within a system where there's a high degree of autonomy is actually an interesting test, isn't it, of the system itself. To see, because we see the autonomy brings a lot of value. But then when it comes to something like COVID and a reaction to COVID or a pandemic or other systemic change, how easy is that to then make those changes when you've got this high degree of autonomy? Will everybody, you know, kind of move in line where necessary, but in their own particularly autonomous way? It's an interesting question.

Yeah, but I think that if we all had the same goal and for example we decided to still have a national examination even during this COVID period because it makes easier to access the next education level and so on and then at the same time we can also understand what has happened during those times and there was quite well agreed that yes, we do it and we will try to understand what has weak sides during this pandemic and strong sides, but everybody was having their own strategy how to to reach those goals. In some schools, there were more distance learning, in some schools less, as of course the conditions allowed. And even the teaching materials that were used, they were different, although central government provided for free all the digital materials also during crisis. So I think that if you know what is the goal, what you have to achieve, and what is the national framework or curriculum, then everybody operating inside can actually make wise decisions on the spot. So, of course, because autonomy needs transparency, so you can see what is achieved. And of course, as we gather huge amount of data in Estonia, we make it also available for everybody. So you can see what's the situation in your school or your neighbor's school, what has been the results, how qualified are the teachers, how much square meters do you have per student. Yeah, so everything is available. You can just see and ask when the local government representative is there, why it's doing better in the neighborhood, or why you are doing— or you can be positive also, say that, oh, congratulate that, how well we have advanced. So very good. So it's, if the parents want to, then they can themselves also look at this.

Now it's interesting that it promotes kind of sharing and questions and innovation. In fact, if you get some cross-fertilization of good ideas that are happening somewhere with others, that's very nice. And then just one of the things I also saw was the new strategy seems to emphasize the Estonian language and culture quite strongly as well in terms of the vision for 2035. And where does that sit with your education vision?

Yeah, we have still two languages at a basic school level, I mean, in Estonian schools, historically even Russian-speaking schools. And some of them are really good, actually, as Andrey Schleicher says, that we have the best Russian schools in the world because they are better than Russian schools in Russia according to PISA. But they are still behind Estonian schools, and the level of teaching Estonian language is very different in different regions, and it's difficult to continue on upper secondary level and higher education level. So it's a very important but everybody learns actually this language also already from the kindergarten and basic school level. And that's what you have emphasized so much, because you really need to know the language, even the culture, to get a good job. Always you are just a little bit— you're in a worse situation when you go out from school, and it's not anything we would like to have.

And are the— forgive my ignorance on this— but are the universities operating in Estonian primarily?

Yes, both universities and even upper secondary education institutions. Yeah, actually. So if you want to get a secondary education, there are differences, but most of the language of instruction is still Estonian on that level. So, okay, but two different systems are existing on the level of basic education, first 9 years.

Ah, no, that's very good. And let me, let me just wrap up with one final question, if I may. Obviously we've said that the Smart Active 2035 strategy is there. What, where do you see as the big areas that you will be continuing to innovate on and work to develop?

The key areas, yeah, as I already said, is personalized education. What is it? It is actually how it is used. How is it used in a way that really employers understand what kind of competencies they need It goes up to those micro degrees, maybe where employers say that they don't need long 2-year master programs, it's enough with 2 months for some areas and so on. And it is possible, it's not only personalized from the person or student, but even from our side, but we may be in different fields, we need a different approach to education system as a whole. So and then that's what we have to manage.

No, very good, interesting times. And do you think that will positively maintain your PISA status up in the top echelons?

Yeah, nobody knows. We are trying not to do anything specific to be good in PISA results. OECD is a quite clever organization and they are changing actually all the time, and actually it should correspond to recent needs of world economy. But of course, what has helped is that PISA test is digital in many countries. We are not used to use that kind of tests and so on, but we are not doing anything specific. We are trying to copy.

But I think actually Andreas is very keen on supporting innovation in education systems anyway, and I think he'd be the first person to say he wouldn't want countries to be making decisions on the basis of what—

absolutely—

to gain the PISA results.

Yeah, we are not saying that the situation is perfect right now, and we would We have not changed. One of the secrets of success is probably that we are trying to still change the weak areas and to, of course, find them first. And that's what we have to do.

Yeah, keep, keep learning, keep improving. Yeah, very good. Well, thank you, Marta. Really interesting kind of introduction, I suppose, for many people, many of the listeners, for what's going on in Estonia. And it's good to be able to share some of that with my audience. So thank you very much for your involvement in the conversation.

Thank you.

All the best.

Thank you.

Have a great day.

Bye.

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