Abstract:

Supporting innovation, strengthening economic development and growth, and generally increasing public well-being, tertiary education plays a crucial role in the society. Some European universities are among the world’s most prestigious. The aim of this paper is to evaluate tertiary education according to the fields of education and the volume of allocated government expenditures in European countries. The empirical analysis evaluates the share of students in tertiary education according to ten fields of education (International Standard Classification of Education ISCED – Fields of Education and Training) and the relation between government expenditures and the number of students in tertiary education (Bachelor's, Master's and Doctoral level). The analysis focuses on the period 2013-2018 for the selected set of 28 European countries, with using hierarchical cluster analysis and correlation analysis.

Social sciences, journalism, information and communication technologies, and business, administration and law, accounting for 33.4%, were the fields of education with the highest share of tertiary-education students in European countries in the period 2013-2018. The second most often selected field at the tertiary education level were engineering, manufacturing and construction, accounting for 15.4% of all enrolled students, and the third most often studied field was health and welfare, which accounted for 13.7% of all tertiary- education students. By use of cluster analysis, the European countries were divided into six clusters according to the similarity of representations of students in tertiary education by fields of education. The results in all clusters of European countries demonstrate a similar share of students in tertiary education, in particular in social sciences, 9.6% on average, and information and communication technologies, 4.7% on average. In the evaluated period, the volume of government expenditures on tertiary education in the 28 European countries ranged from 0.3% to 1.7% of GDP. Only a weak negative correlation was found between government expenditures on tertiary education and the number of students by the levels of tertiary education. At the tertiary level, educational institutions in European countries are mainly publicly funded, although there are substantial and growing levels of private funding. An increased interest in other fields of tertiary education is expected in the future with respect to demands of the labour market.

Keywords:

Tertiary education, Fields of education, Government expenditures, Evaluation, European Countries.