The Future of Education

Territorial inequalities in education remain a persistent challenge, which can impact students’ educational trajectories, skill acquisition, and subsequent integration into the labour market. One of the critical milestones in education system is represented by participation in key national examinations. Consequently, a non-participation or poor performance may signal educational vulnerability, with effects on limiting the development of essential competences needed for employment in the job market and long-term career. The paper analyzes territorial differences in participation and performance in the National Evaluation and the Baccalaureate in Romania with the purpose of determining to which extent the considered indicators can be used to understand the risk of school dropout and future labour market exclusion. Based on aggregated data at county level, the study takes into consideration a series of indicators related to exam participation, non-attendance, academic performance, and socio-territorial context. The analysis addresses three main research questions concerning territorial variation in exam participation, the relevance of participation as a proxy for educational risk, and the role of the rural–urban context. In terms of methodology, the paper combines descriptive statistics, correlation analysis, and linear regression models, highlighting that participation in the National Evaluation and participation in the Baccalaureate do not follow a cumulative territorial pattern across educational cycles. It is observed that greater educational vulnerability is displayed by the counties with a higher share of students from rural areas. With all these, the rural context only amplifies the results but does not independently determine vulnerability. The study highlights the importance of early educational outcomes for the development competences that further supports both the transition to upper education and the dynamics and structure of the labor market. The study can serve as a referral for interested parties in contexts characterized by persistent territorial inequalities. 

Acknowledgement: This work was funded by the EU’s NextGenerationEU instrument through the National Recovery and Resilience Plan of Romania - Pillar III-C9-I8, managed by the Ministry of Research, Innovation and Digitization, within the project entitled „JobKG—A Knowledge Graph of the Romanian Job Market based on Natural Language Processing”, contract no. 760274/26.03.2024, code CF 178/31.07.2023