Electronic Signature Licitness for Education in European Union

How to eSign a document: electronic signature licitness for Education in European Union

[Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] estonia 1991 after more than 50 years of soviet occupation and communist dictatorship estonia regained its independence the legacy of the communist era for the estonians was as for all the other countries of the former soviet union disastrous in 1991 estonian gdp per capita was less than 3 500 the equivalent in today's terms of countries like bolivia or el salvador of course the worst was yet to come the disintegration of the soviet bloc was a hard blow for his member countries and of course estonia was no exception in 1992 its economy shrank by more than 20 it was time to build a new country model and visual politics fans this was an idea that the estonians took very very seriously while some of the offshoots of the soviet union such as ukraine uzbekistan and belarus plunged into instability crisis and autocracy estonia's story was completely different [Music] today estonia is one of the most prosperous countries in the world its potential is immense and its standard of living is improving all the time in 2020 estonia's price adjusted gdp per capita approached 40 000 which has already enabled it to surpass countries like spain [Music] and that is not all the development of practically all its macroeconomic parameters beats not only spain but also the majority of european countries by a long way for example it's one of the countries with the healthiest public accounts in the world and has the highest rates of entrepreneurship of any european country in relation to its population each year more than 20 companies are created for every 1 000 inhabitants that's six times higher than the eu average and so estonia has become the nation of european entrepreneurs something like a small and yeah let's be honest i see silicon valley in the very heart of the european union but having said that the question is how on earth have they achieved such an evolution in such a short time what is the secret behind the estonian model what are the ingredients of their success [Music] well here as we told you in an exclusive video on patreon we can highlight several factors from fiscal policy to its commitment to technology in addition among the most important ingredients of estonian success is its education system you may not know it and you would never have imagined it but estonia has the best education system in europe in fact it calls itself the education nation but do you want to know what is so special about its educational system what exactly are its most important characteristics and key aspects if you do of course you do check this out [Music] the how is more important than the how much the success of the estonian educational model is not a matter of opinion it is something confirmed by all the institutions dedicated to evaluating the various educational systems including of course the pisa report ing to pisa estonia literally leads not in only europe but the world after singapore this small baltic country is the top scorer in all three basic skills reading mathematics and science and that is not the end of it let's move on to some important facts the country has the world's highest percentage of high achieving students from lower income families and it records the smallest difference in results between rural and urban environments what's more they have the lowest rate of students without basic education just five percent and one of the lowest grade repetition rates in the oecd as if all of that was not enough it also ranks highest in terms of foreign language proficiency [Music] and so visualpolitik friends here the social elevator is running at full speed estonia has overtaken the finnish education system itself until now the benchmark for education in europe so how did they do it and right here i know what many of you are thinking all right grant sure sure sure they spend an awful lot more than all of us on education but in this case if you said that you'd be very wrong [Music] yes estonia makes significant effort in education but public spending per pupil is by far not the highest in the oecd not even if we adjust spending for the differences in price and wages in fact there are many countries with much higher expenditure per pupil and yet much worse results do you want an example well how about get your visualport bingo cards out spain check this out as you can see despite having the best educational results by far estonia is far from the country that spends the most on education per pupil in fact its level of spending is well below the oecd and eu averages even taking into account the price difference which brings us directly to an idea that i think bears repeating no politicians spending more on education is not the recipe for success if it were that simple it'd be pretty easy wouldn't it it'd be easy enough to spend more to get better results the reality however is totally different it's not about how much is spent but above all about how the funds are used so please politicians and journalists of all colours and all parties stop using the money mantra once and for all let's take another example iceland spends much much much more per people than estonia and i repeat this is even taking into account the differences in salaries and prices so if we go by the political logic that more spending means better results than iceland should have a much better education system than estonia however surprise it's not only that estonia wins it's the iceland ing to pisa for example is one of the worst performing countries in europe spending my friends it's not everything but having said that and now we know that it's not just a question of money what do you say we get right down to it and dive into the key aspects of the estonian education system what can we all learn from them stick around for that and more puns check this out [Music] the pillars of estonian prosperity [Music] okay visualpolitik fans clear your mind for a while because the educational model we are going to talk about has little to do with anything you've ever seen so far we're going to talk about an educational model that strangely is not subordinated to political interests but the needs of the human capital that the modern world has including of course the world of business and entrepreneurship wait wait wait wait an education system designed so that students can find a highly skilled job quickly upon completion of their studies that seems almost crazy well yeah that's correct in estonia education has become one of the key pillars on which the country's economic plans hinge now the question the big question is how exactly does the estonian educational model differ from that of other countries well the first key can be found in independence independence of both schools and teachers [Music] and you see although in estonia all schools have to adhere to a framework program of minimum content set by the government the application of this framework is very open and each school institute or even teacher has a lot of independence in deciding both the final educational curriculum and the method [Music] and believe me when i tell you that both school and teachers were the first ones interested in making all of this work among other things because of the dual estonian model of public financing of education model what what on earth is that well let's see in estonia private education barely exists however despite this public schools are subject to an intense model of competition [Music] on the one hand the funding of schools follows a philosophy that closely resembles the process of market competition the income that schools receive is determined by the number of students they attract the more students a school gets the more funding it receives on the other hand the academic performance and characteristics of each school are constantly evaluated and the results are fully public this generates competitive dynamic of parents willing to enroll their children in the best schools and institutes and in turn those schools attract more students and get more funding this process also increases the pressure on the leaders and teachers of the schools with the worst performance making them try harder and that's not all it is no longer just a matter of the best schools and colleges being more in demand having better reputation and more resources but the good results also guarantee their survival because one of the great challenges facing estonia is demography in the last 15 years the number of students in the country has fallen by 40 which has forced the government and municipalities to close the surplus schools and institutes however it's only those with the worst results that are closed so you can imagine the interest that both schools and teachers have in improving the results and attracting more students incidentally at this point it must be said that the principals and governing bodies of each school have a very very high level of autonomy in such things as for example deciding which teachers they hire what salaries teaching staff receive and how they distribute the funding they receive from the government that's right teachers salaries in estonia are not the same in all schools nor are they determined by collective agreement they are decided within the schools themselves of course the more funding a center receives the higher salaries it can pay it's simply the result of competition what's more this greater level of autonomy allows each centre to differentiate itself from others by specializing in different areas art economics science and so on and so forth there are even so-called elite schools a type of school designed to be able to develop all the abilities of the brightest students but that is not the end of the story teachers are also subject to higher levels of competence and more responsibilities than in other countries [Music] for example if students perform poorly over a long period of time the teacher may even have to be dismissed but in order not to have to go that extreme estonian teachers receive intense continuous training which allows them to improve and refresh themselves in terms of knowledge content or teaching methods it is an intense and compulsory training that brings many benefits for example the adaptation to new technologies [Applause] in return teachers have more teaching freedom and influence in decision making for example 83 of school principals in estonia say that teachers play an important role in tasks such as designing school policies the curriculum and teaching methods in this regards this baltic country is almost double the oecd average of 42 isn't that amazing everything absolutely everything in estonia's educational model is based on competition and remember that we are talking about an essentially public system it seems almost otherworldly now at this point you may be wondering okay all right but what exactly does the school curriculum look like does it have anything to do with the country's very high rate of business creation let's take a look at that now [Music] side by side until the final success we mentioned at the beginning of the video the estonian educational model is primarily oriented towards business and preparation for the world of work for example representatives of both civil society and the companies themselves participate in the design of academic programs but this is not the only area of collaboration both secondary and tertiary education have extensive work experience programs that allow estonian students to enter the labour market with some experience in this regard estonia has made a very strong commitment to include work placements and vocational education which would also be the equivalent of vocational training and also in university master's degrees and we are not talking about the typical month-long internships these programs include internships that account for 50 of the training hours but apart from all the collaboration with companies we can highlight another very particular characteristics estonians are obsessed with equality and the educational face and i'm not talking about equality in the sense of making sure that everyone gets a degree but that everyone has the same conditions regardless of their socio-economic environment in other words equality of opportunities not of results that means that in estonia not only is education paid for by the state including university but also textbooks and even the cafeteria students in compulsory education have free meals at school in addition all pupils up to the age of 19 have free health cover as well as free nurses in primary schools free routine medical checkups and free dental care the fundamental idea is that regardless of the socioeconomic status they are born into all students can have the same opportunities in short competition specialization integration with the business world and equal opportunities in a country with little bureaucracy and low taxes it's not so bad don't you think of course not everything is perfect and while estonia's education system has proven to be by far the best in europe today it still has some challenges too in particular the shortage of subject-specific teachers and improving the educational performance of ethnic russian students [Music] but there you have it these are the key aspects to estonia's educational model the best educational system in europe and one of the best in the world one of the ingredients that has allowed this country not only to make a huge leap in prosperity but also to become a technological leader and a hotbed of startups the question is do you think your country should take notes from estonian success story what do you think you would like to see in that regard in your country leave us your comments in the box below and as always if you like this video please like it so we know and subscribe to our channel by clicking on the little bell down there and by the way if you like the work we do support us and join our community on patreon where in addition to contributing to visualpolitik you can get exclusive content as well as periodic gifts and much more we'll leave you the link in the description down there all the best and i'll see you next time [Music] you