Education level in the population
Annual.
Figures are presented at the national level. Data does, however, include information that makes it possible to provide figures at municipal and county level.
360 - Division for Education Statistics
Sections 2-2 and 3-2 of The Statistics Act of 16 June 1989 and the Ministry of Finance's delegation letter of February 13 February 1990.
Data are delivered pursuant to EU Community Acts 1925/99, 3711/91.
The data is delivered to OECD, UNESCO and Eurostat.
The purpose of these statistics is to present individually based statistics on the population's highest level of education.
Statistics on the population's highest level of education have been previously compiled in connection with the 1950, 1960, 1970 and 1980 census. In addition a status report was prepared on the population's highest level of education in 1975.
The information on the population's level of education was first collected as part of the Population and Housing Census in 1970 (FoB70). Information on the population's level of education has since been updated each year with annual files on education completed in Norway. The 1980 Population and Housing Census was used to update the level of education for Norwegians who completed a degree abroad between 1970 and 1980. In 1990, information was collected on education completed abroad by foreign-born residents who immigrated to Norway for the first time between 01. November 1980 and 31. December 1990, and were aged 16 and over at the end of the first year they arrived. This survey was called Education Completed Abroad. A similar survey was conducted in 1999 for all Norwegian residents with a foreign background who were listed in the Register of the Population's Level of Education with an unknown level of education. Also included in the 1999 survey were non-respondents to the 1991 survey and Norwegians who were living abroad when the Population's Level of Education register was first created in 1970.
Important users of the education statistics are public administration, special interest organizations, the media, researchers, business and industry. Key users among the ministries are, in particular, the Ministry of Education and Research, the Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Children and Family Affairs. The statistics will also be used by international organizations such as the EU, the OECD and UNESCO.
The Register of the Population's Level of Education encompasses all individuals registered as a resident in Norway per 01. October XXXX and who are aged 16 and over at the end of the reporting year. Also included are 15-year-olds who have completed lower secondary school or are registered in upper secondary education or above.
The level of education register is originally based on information from the 1970 Population and Housing Census. Each year, the database is updated with new information on completed degrees in Norway. Education completed abroad and supported by the State Education Loan Fund is included from 1986 onwards. Statistics Norway's special surveys Education Completed Abroad from 1990 and 1999 have also been used to update the database. The Health Personnel Register (HPR) and National Certificate Database (NVB) have been used as additional data sources since 2003, - and the Norwegian computer system for cases involving foreign nationals and refugees (DUF) since 2008.
The National Education Database (NUDB) was created in 2002 and contains individually based education statistics dating back to 1970. Each year the database is updated with records of current students and completed educations for the previous academic year. Course codes from the completed educations are used to update the population's level of education where applicable. If an individual has completed two courses of the same level, the one with the highest class level is chosen. Specific fields of study are chosen over general fields and newer courses are counted before older courses. Credit points have also been used to determine education level since 1999. Between 1999 and 2004, a tertiary level education was attained with a single year full-time loading of 60 credit points. From 01. October 2005 onwards, 120 credit points are required to attain a tertiary level of education.
Not relevant.
Pursuant to the Statistical Act, Statistics Norway collects student data from the administrative systems of the various tertiary institutions. The most common administrative systems are M-STAS is used primarily by university colleges, and FS is used primarily by universities. Tertiary institutions that do not use M-STAS or FS must use their own administrative systems to create data files in the format specified by Statistics Norway. Information on completed doctoral degrees is collected from NIFU STEP
Control and revision is performed on all data received from educational institutions. It encompasses deletion of duplicate records, a control for correct and valid values for each variable and checks for missing information. Several variables are re-coded to comply with control programs run by Statistics Norway and Personal ID-numbers are referenced against Statistics Norway's population database to check for errors.
Not relevant.
The general rule is not to publish data if less than 3 individuals are found within a cell or unit in a table. This is to prevent identification of individuals within the statistics.
Completed education: Educational activities that are completed at an educational institution during the period in question.
Type of educational programme: Classified according to the revised Norwegian Standard Classification of Education (NUS2000), which classifies educational programmes by level and field of study. All NUS2000 codes are assigned a corresponding international code (ISCED97) for international reporting purposes.
Class level: According to the NUS89 classification, upper secondary school began at class level 10, whereas according to NUS2000 it begins at class level 11. This is due to Reform 97, which introduced a ten-year primary and lower secondary school system by lowering the school age to six
Education level: The definitions for level of education were revised in 2006. Definitions are as follows (effective from 01. October, 2005):
PRIMARY AND LOWER SECONDARY LEVEL
- All individuals who have completed lower secondary school.
- Individuals who completed an upper secondary education shorter than two years in duration, in the period 1975/76 to 1994/95. This primarily entails people who only completed foundation courses at upper secondary school.
- Individuals who completed an upper secondary education shorter than three years in duration, from 1995/96 onwards. This primarily entails people who completed foundation courses or advanced courses I at upper secondary school.
UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL LEVEL
- All individuals who completed upper secondary school prior to 1974/75, regardless of schooling duration.
- Individuals who completed an upper secondary education 2 years or longer in duration, in the period 1975/76 to 1994/95. This primarily entails people who completed advanced courses I or advanced courses II at upper secondary school.
- Individuals who completed an upper secondary education three years or longer in duration, from 1995/96 onwards. This primarily entails people who completed advanced courses II at upper secondary school.
- All individuals who completed an education between the upper secondary and tertiary level (supplementary education to upper secondary school), regardless of when the education was completed.
- Individuals who completed less than 120 credit points at a tertiary institution, from 1998/99 onwards.
TERTIARY LEVEL - undergraduate
- Individuals who completed a tertiary degree up to four years in duration, prior to 1998/99.
- Individuals, who have not completed a full tertiary degree, but have completed 120 credit points or more at the tertiary level, from 1998/99 onwards.
TERTIARY LEVEL - postgraduate
- All individuals who have completed a postgraduate tertiary degree. The majority of these degrees will be five years or longer in duration.
- All individuals who have completed a doctoral degree.
Education statistics are reported to OECD in accordance with the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED). UNESCO adopted this standard in 1997, replacing the International Standard Classification of Education from 1976. ISCED76 was used in earlier annual versions of the population's level of education, whereas ISCED97 was adopted from 1999.
Educational programmes are classified according to the Norwegian Standard Classification of Education (NUS) which was initially created by Statistics Norway in 1970 and was last updated in 2000 (NUS2000). A six-digit education code is used, where the first digit indicates the level of education and the other digits indicate field of study. The second and third digits indicate subject group, and together the six-digit code indicates an individual programme of education. Education level taken from the NUS89 standard is not directly comparable with education level using NUS2000. The main change with NUS2000 is a new level of education for supplementary courses at an intermediate level between upper secondary and tertiary education.
Although an individual may complete several educational programmes in the course of their life, only the highest of these with be registered in database for the population's attained level of education. Errors may be linked to the education files that form the basis for the level of education. For example, individual tertiary institutions may wrongly define a student as meeting the requirements for completing a degree. Reporting of combined social science degrees (Cand.mag.) is a problem with several institutions because these degrees do not have a set curriculum and are only registered as complete when a diploma is issued. In many cases, this occurs some time after the student actually completed their degree and may be reported to Statistics Norway latter than the actual time of completion.
Sources of error may also be connected with education completed abroad. The main sources of errors lie with immigrants with an unknown level of education and Norwegian-born citizens who completed education abroad between 1980 and 1986. The number of immigrants listed with an unknown level of education has been substantially reduced since Education Completed Abroad surveys were conducted in 1991 and 1999. The State Educational Loan Fund is the main source of data for education completed abroad by Norwegian-born citizens. This fund, however, does not include foreign-born residents who leave Norway for a period of time to complete an education, and later return to Norway.
Education statistics are registerbased and sampling errors do not apply in theory. In reality, some pupils or students may be left out of the statistics as Statistics Norway may not receive responses from all known institutions, or not being aware of new institutions. Additionally, an institution may accidentally leave out an entire class without Statistics Norway identifying the error in their control processes.
Errors may occur in the administrative system of educational institutions, in particular with self-reported information from the student or erroneous reporting from the data provider. A number of these non-sampling errors will be identified as part of control and revision routines performed by Statistics Norway.
Not relevant.
Systematic collection of the population's attained level of education began in 1970. Prior to this, information on level of education was collected in connection with the 1950 and 1960 censuses.
Comparability of education level is difficult in the 1970's and 1980's. Comparisons in these earlier years should be restricted to the three principal education levels: primary and lower secondary, upper secondary and tertiary education.
Definitions for education level have been revised in 2006 to better reflect international standards. In general, the demands have been increased for attaining upper secondary and tertiary levels of education. Data for 2004/05 is published using both the old and new definitions. See section 4.1 for more details.
Education statistics are individually based and therefore easily linked to other individual-based statistics at Statistics Norway. Education statistics are used comprehensively by labour market statistics, health statistics, living conditions statistics and income and wage statistics. The education statistics are also used in various sample surveys directed by Statistics Norway.
General home page for education statistics
Electronic edition of Current Education Statistics
Population's level of education
All education statistics at Statistics Norway is stored in a proper, standardized manner in consultation with the Data Inspectorate.
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