Improving Health and Social Cohesion through Education

✍ Scribed by OECD, Centre for Educational Research and Innovation

• Publisher: OECD Publishing
• Year: 2010
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 222
• Edition: Pap/Dgd
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Todays global policy climate underlines the importance of better addressing non-economic dimensions of well-being and social progress such as health, social engagement, political interest and crime. Education plays an important role in shaping indicators of progress. However, we understand little about the causal effects, the causal pathways, the role of contexts and the relative impacts that different educational interventions have on social outcomes. This report addresses challenges in assessing the social outcomes of learning by providing a synthesis of the existing evidence, original data analyses and policy discussions. The report finds that education has the potential to promote health as well as civic and social engagement. Education may reduce inequalities by fostering cognitive, social and emotional skills and promoting healthy lifestyles, participatory practices and norms. These efforts are most likely to be successful when family and community environments are aligned with the efforts made in educational institutions. This calls for ensuring policy coherence across sectors and stages of education.

✦ Table of Contents

Foreword......Page 5
Acknowledgements......Page 7
Table of contents......Page 9
Executive summary......Page 13
Introduction......Page 17
The policy climate......Page 18
The role of education......Page 19
The Social Outcomes of Learning (SOL) project......Page 21
Challenges for assessing the social outcomes of learning......Page 22
References......Page 27
The empirical framework......Page 29
Introduction......Page 30
Evaluating the overall performance of education systems......Page 31
Identifying features of the education systems that work......Page 47
Identifying for whom education is likely to have a stronger impact......Page 52
Additional considerations......Page 53
Conclusion......Page 57
References......Page 61
Education and civic and social engagement......Page 67
Introduction......Page 68
The relationship between education and civic and social engagement......Page 73
Causal pathways......Page 85
The role of family and community......Page 90
The role of social status......Page 92
Summary of findings: What we know and don’t know......Page 94
References......Page 106
Education and health......Page 113
Introduction......Page 114
The relationship between education and health......Page 120
Causal pathways......Page 129
The role of family and community......Page 141
The role of social status......Page 146
Interventions that address multiple pathways and contexts simultaneously......Page 148
Summary of findings: What we know and don’t know......Page 149
References......Page 165
Improving health through cost-effective educational interventions......Page 183
Economic evaluation and policy making......Page 184
The cost-effectiveness of educational interventions on obesity......Page 187
Conclusion......Page 196
Annex 5.A1. The Epidemiological Model......Page 199
Annex 5.A2. The WHO-CHOICE Model......Page 200
References......Page 202
Conclusion: policy messages and future agenda......Page 205
Policy messages......Page 206
Implications for research......Page 211
The role of the OECD......Page 214
Conclusion......Page 216
References......Page 218