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TARTU, Estonia—Most educators and policymakers can rattle off a list of

international educational powerhouses: Korea, Singapore, Japan, and Finland.

But there’s an overlooked member of the list: Estonia. Even as educators from

around the world flock to Finland to discover its magic formula, Estonia, just a two-

hour ferry ride away, has not aroused the same degree of interest.

Is Estonia the New Finland? With a focus on equity, the northern European country has quietly joined the ranks

of the global education elite.

First-grade students take a computer class in Tallinn, Estonia.

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Ints Kalnins / Reuters

That could change if the country remains on its upward trajectory. In 2012,

Estonia’s 15-year-olds ranked 11th in math and reading and sixth in science out of

the 65 countries that participated in an international test that compares

educational systems from around the world (called the Programme for

International Student Assessment, or PISA).

In addition to beating out western nations such as France and Germany and

essentially tying Finland in math and science, Estonia also had the smallest

number of weak performers in all of Europe, about 10 percent in math and reading

and 5 percent in science.

Those numbers differ markedly from how the United States is performing, which

continues to be stuck in the middle of the pack in all three subjects. More than a

quarter of U.S. students were low-performers in math. But few people are asking

what meaningful lessons we can draw from Estonia’s success. In fact, many U.S.

researchers and educators argue it’s misleading and unhelpful to compare the

United States to any top performing country because of demographic and cultural

differences.

While there is less income inequality in Estonia than in the United States—and,

with 1.3 million people, the country is significantly smaller—the Baltic nation also

has its share of cultural diversity. When it achieved independence from the Soviet

Union 25 years ago, Estonian became the official language and the language of

school instruction. Yet about a fifth of its students come from families that still

speak Russian at home, and they have historically lagged behind their native

speaking counterparts on tests such as PISA.

Estonia’s performance on PISA isn’t in spite of its poor students; it’s because of them.

Though its students may come from diverse backgrounds, Estonia’s schools give

them very similar educational experiences. In embracing students of all

backgrounds and income levels, Estonia has succeeded not only on exams but on a

goal that many policymakers, educators, and advocates say the United States must

achieve: creating an educational system based on equity. The idea is a holdover

from the Soviet era and one that the country intends to keep even as it continues to

grapple with how to modernize its schools and further shrink the already small

achievement gaps among its students.

As a result of this commitment, Estonia’s performance on PISA isn’t in spite of its

poor students; it’s in no small part because of them.

“We have been able to keep education very even,” said Jürgen Ligi, the Estonian

minister of education. “It has worked.”

On the 2012 PISA math exam, more than a third of low-income students were

among the country’s top performers. Estonia had the second smallest gap in

performance between its poorest and richest students out of all participating

countries known as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

(OECD). Students in its lowest income quartile scored about as well as American

students in the second highest income quartile.

Fifth-graders at Konguta Kool prepare for a math lesson in the computer lab. (Sarah Butrymowicz / The Hechinger Report)

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Marc Tucker, president of National Center on Education and the Economy in

Washington, D.C., visited Estonia last year to find out what they’re doing right. He

said that after the fall of the Iron Curtain other former Soviet satellites, such as

Hungary and the Czech Republic, transitioned to a system preferentially suited to

the needs of its elites. Estonia, however, kept giving equal opportunities to students

of all backgrounds.

“What [we] saw in Estonia was not a new education system, it was an old one,”

Tucker said. “By every account they did not change the system after the wall came

down…. It’s hardly surprising they continued to get great results.”

There are many factors that may contribute to Estonia’s success on PISA beyond

their focus on equality. Education continues to be highly valued. Teacher

autonomy is relatively high, which has been shown to be related to better test

scores. Teachers stay with the same students in grades one to three – or sometimes

even up to sixth grade - allowing deep relationships to develop. Many officials and

educators say teachers here are good at supporting students and preventing them

from getting off track, in contrast to the U.S., where teachers spend a lot of time

intervening to help students who have fallen behind.

But many educators said that an emphasis on giving everyone a similar educational

experience is a crucial piece of the puzzle. “We really follow the straight line that

everyone is equal,” said Karin Lukk, principal of Tartu Kivilinna Kool, a grade 1-9

school in Estonia’s second largest city. “It doesn’t matter what kind of family you

come from, you can still achieve a lot.”

R E L A T E D S T O R Y

A Country Created Through Music

That approach starts at the very beginning. Early childhood education is free

beginning at 18 months (when paid maternity or paternity leave ends). Everyone

gets free lunch, meaning teachers might not know exactly what a child’s

background is. College is free. Private schools, although an increasing threat to

public education, are still a relatively small slice of the educational system.

Estonian schools are often economically integrated, so poor and rich students are

frequently in the same classrooms.

By comparison, in the United States, students do not get the same educational

experience. Quality of childcare and schools vary widely depending on income.

Families with the most money often have access to the best child-care centers and

most elite colleges. Schools are often segregated both by race and income, with

poor students often having fewer resources and less experienced teachers.

The divisions for American students also occur within schools. A 2016 study by the

Brookings Institute found that on average, states track three-quarters of eighth

graders in math, meaning they might be put on a path in middle school that

determines which level of math class they’ll end up in in their final year of high

school. (The study found, however, that the more tracking a state does, the better

the results for those that end up in the top tier of classes.)

But for students in the lower tiers, other research suggests tracking isn’t helpful. In

a 2015 study, researchers analyzing PISA results and responses on student surveys

about what kind of math topics they are taught have discovered that students from

less affluent backgrounds in all participating countries are taught less difficult math

and typically perform worse on the assessment. They argue that “the weaknesses

of their math coursework actually keeps [low-income] students from catching up.”

Estonia has the smallest gap out of OECD countries between low- and high-income

students in the kind of math they are taught and one of the smallest gaps in

performance. That 2015 study attempted to separate out how much the instruction

a student receives in school contributes to their scores. If home life or other factors

beyond a school's control were the sole determinant, researchers would have found

no relationship. Instead, they found that, on average, in OECD countries, the

students' diverse educational opportunities explained 33 percent of the difference

in scores between low- and high-income students. In the United States it was 37

percent, while in Estonia it was just 16 percent.

According to the paper's co-author William Schmidt, the study's takeaway is that

"inequality [in test scores] due to schooling in the U.S. does not have to be, as there

are other countries in which the percentage of such inequality is much lower."

Estonian schools follow a national curriculum that dictates what students must

cover in each subject each year through ninth grade. At that point, students decide

whether to go to upper secondary school for three more years, where they focus on

academics, or to vocational school to prepare for a specific career. Different schools

may require different entrance exams, but students who want to go to upper

secondary school almost always are able to do so, according to officials and

educators.

Most students, roughly two-thirds, select upper secondary school, according to the

Estonian Ministry of Education and Research. In larger schools, they may also pick

an area study – like science and mathematics or humanities. That choice is based

on interest, though, not prior test scores or grades. And students still take a

common set of courses that makes sure students have basic skills in all subjects.

Yet it’s up to the school to figure out how all the students attain this common skill

set. Estonian schools are free to separate students however they want as long as

they learn the same material in each grade. In the late 1990s, educators at Tartu

Kivilinna Kool split up their students into three groups for math classes: high,

average and low. At each level, the school’s 950 students followed the same basic

curriculum, but they moved at different speeds or, in some cases for the more

advanced students, dove deeper into the material. It was a departure to what they’d

done under the Soviet system.

But by 2008, they abandoned the practice. “It didn’t work,” Lukk said. The lowest

group “didn’t develop at all. They just vegetated.”

“My problem is whether we can keep [the test results] when stressing creativity. Will it be in some conflict?”

Konguta Kool—an elementary school in a small village about an hour east of Tartu –

had some success when it divided its students up into high and low performing

groups, but ultimately didn’t have the staff to keep the system.

On a sunny March day, Konguta’s 15 fifth graders were warming up for a math

lesson in the school’s small computer lab. They logged in to their laptops and

signed on to a program to practice addition. Soon the only sound in the room was

that of mouse clicks as they entered answers.

One girl’s screen started as basic as possible with 1+1. Within two minutes, she was

up to problems like 2589 + 1233.

The school makes use of drills like this so students can practice calculating in their

heads. But teachers also try to plan lessons that connect math to real life. Stairs to

the lower level of the school are marked with descending negative numbers –

during the winter they use them to mark the temperature. One wall is covered with

charts: results of a poll of students’ favorite bread or tallies of how many times

different birds have been seen in the garden.

The school generally does well on the national exam its students take at the end of

sixth grade, said English teacher Katrin Libe. Those results aren’t made publically

available, though; Estonian students are tested once every three years and school

level results are only published at the end of 12th grade.

And while Estonia’s schools are currently benefiting from adhering to the old

system, there are also changes creeping in that might disrupt its academic focus. In

Konguta’s teachers lounge, Libe and math teacher Pille Granovski spoke about a

recent conference they attended, where a psychologist suggested early education

should focus more on emotional and social skills than starting to lay the

groundwork for academics. The school has an early childhood center attached to it,

which enrolls students as young as 18 months old.

“I think the learning process is quite playful [there],” Libe said.

“I don’t know,” Granovski responded. “It is playful but you still have to start

learning very early.”

Educators all over Estonia are grappling with new teaching ideas and philosophies,

trying to reconcile them with the more rigid system they went through. This

discussion is not unlike conversations in America as most states shift to the

Common Core State Standards, which have led to major changes in how teachers

structure their lessons to demand higher order thinking.

Estonia’s traditional educational system still often favors more teacher-centered

classrooms and emphasizes learning facts over developing soft skills. It’s generally

served the country well when it comes to testing, so there is a reluctance to change

entirely.

Teachers at Konguta Kool use online programs for students to practice basic arithmetic. (Sarah Butrymowicz / The Hechinger Report)

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“My problem is whether we can keep [the test results] when stressing creativity,”

Ligi said. “Will it be in some conflict?”

But throughout the country, policymakers and educators are talking about the need

to produce students who can do more than score well on a test, perhaps go on to

become entrepreneurs and creative leaders. Educators are also concerned that

focusing on the average student and bringing up low-achievers to that standard

comes at the expense of pushing gifted students further.

Estonian education philosophy needs to change and is changing, many educators

said, to one that puts more focus on students as individuals and has them drive

more of what happens in the classroom.

Yet it can be hard to get teachers to give up on the traditional ways, let alone attract

good recruits for the teaching profession when pay is still among the lowest in

Europe. Even though teacher training has been completely overhauled at Tartu

University to place more emphasis on how to teach students critical thinking and

communication and less on content knowledge, officials there say it’s taking a while

to trickle down into the classroom.

And a rise in the charts hasn’t bred compliance, among teachers or students. In

PISA student surveys, two-thirds of Estonian students said they are happy at their

school, one of the lowest levels in OECD countries.

Estonian PISA Coordinator Gunda Tire says Estonians are complainers by nature,

so they’ll respond differently to a question about happiness than, say, Americans

would. (Nearly 80 percent of U.S. students said they were happy at school on the

survey.)

That cultural attitude leaves them with a constant drive to keep improving their

schools. “Nothing is ever good enough,” Tire said. “No one would say the school

system is doing fine.”

This post appears courtesy of The Hechinger Report.

A B O U T T H E A U T H O R

A B O U T T H E A U T H O R

S A R A H B U T R Y M O W I C Z is a staff writer at The Hechinger Report.