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Breadcrumb

  1. Home
  2. Methodology and quality
  3. ESMS metadata
  4. Educational expenditure

Educational expenditure

1. Contact
1.1. Contact organisation

Statistics Estonia

1.2. Contact organisation unit

Population and Social Statistics Department

1.3. Contact name

Käthrin Randoja

1.4. Contact person function

Leading Analyst

1.5. Contact mail address

20 Narva Rd., 51009 Tartu, Estonia

1.6. Contact email address

kathrin.randoja [at] stat.ee

1.7. Contact phone number

37254110050

2. Metadata update
2.1. Metadata last certified

27/03/2025

2.2. Metadata last update

27/03/2025

3. Statistical presentation
3.1. Data description

Educational expenditure of educational institutions by type of education and source of financing

3.2. Classification system

International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED 2011)

Type of owner

3.3. Sector coverage

Formal education (pre-primary, general, vocational and higher education)

3.4. Statistical concepts and definitions

Ancillary services – services provided by an educational institution to support the well-being of students (e.g. meals, school transport, dormitories, health services and sports facilities) or provided for the general public (e.g. museums, radio broadcasting, cultural programmes).

Educational expenditure – expenditure on formal education and ancillary services (e.g. catering, school transport, provision of accommodation, healthcare, provision of sports facilities). If an institution has any research and development activities (R&D), then these costs are included in educational expenditure. Educational expenditure consists of labour costs, other current expenditure and investments. If an institution provides other educational services besides formal education (e.g. hobby education or continuing vocational training for adults), the expenses for these services are deducted from total expenditure by type of expenditure.

Investments – costs related to acquiring or increasing the value of non-current assets (both tangible and intangible). Investments are shown at acquisition cost without depreciation. Investments include e.g. construction or capital repairs of buildings; extending facilities; the acquisition of equipment and machinery; establishing study libraries; acquisition of licences and special software. Also included are investments for R&D activities and for the provision of ancillary services.

Labour cost – labour costs include salaries and fringe benefits with all applicable taxes. Labour costs include costs for both teaching and nonteaching staff who provide formal education or ancillary services. Costs for staff engaged in R&D activities are also included here. Labour costs are indicated for natural persons employed based on the Employment Contracts Act as well as the Law of Obligations Act (for persons working based on the Law of Obligations Act only when the taxes paid on such salaries are calculated by the employer; if services are purchased from legal persons based on the Law of Obligations Act, such expenditures are indicated under other current expenditures).

Other current educational expenditures / current expenditure other than for staff compensation – current expenditure of the reference period that are not labour costs or investments. Current expenditures are: lease and rent of buildings or premises; utility costs; acquisition costs of smaller equipment, instruments, materials and other current assets; costs related to business trips; costs of repair works, telecommunications and information technology; costs of contractual and outsourced services; financial aid from own funds given to students, etc. Current expenditures do not include interest costs and costs related to the acquisition of non-current assets or the depreciation of non-current assets.

Private educational institution – an educational institution operating on the basis of the Private Schools Act and providing pre-primary, general, vocational or higher education.

Research and development – basic research, applied research and experimental development carried out in educational institutions. Research and development in enterprises is not included in educational expenditure.

Teaching staff cost – labour costs include salaries and fringe benefits with all applicable taxes. Teaching staff covers people engaged in pedagogical work (e.g. teacher, teacher’s aid, lecturer). If the working time of school staff is divided between different activities, these should be divided proportionally. Teaching staff does not include ancillary services providers, administrative tasks and support staff (e.g. librarian, psychologist, school nurse).

The source of financing/funding – the origin of the money received to cover educational expenditure. The sources are divided as follows:

1) government sources:

- state – sums received from the state budget funds, including from ministries, state institutions (e.g., Estonian Agricultural Registers and Information Board, Environmental Investment Centre) and state-owned foundations (e.g., Innove, Archimedes, Estonian Research Council, etc.);

- local government – sums received from local governments and their subunits (e.g., support, benefits, funds for covering expenses, etc.);

2) private sources:

- private person – tuition fees and other sums received from the student or his/her household for the acquisition of formal education, incl. sponsorship by private persons. E.g., sums to cover ancillary services – school meals, accommodation, school transport.;

- legal person – tuition fees, support, sponsorship, etc. received from private legal persons in Estonia;

- own funds – sums obtained from other activities (e.g., from in-service training), sums obtained based on research and development activities (R&D) agreements, contributions by owners of the educational institution, loans taken;

3) foreign sources /international sources – funds received from foreign legal persons and institutions, international organisations, including European Union programmes or funds. If the state is a co-funder, the sum must be divided by the proportion of co-funding, whereas the share of the state must be reflected under state funds and foreign funds under foreign sources.

3.5. Statistical unit

Educational institution

3.6. Statistical population

Educational institutions

FRAME

List of licensed public and private schools and list of public universities compiled by the Ministry of Education and Research

3.7. Reference area

Estonia as a whole

3.8. Time coverage

2005–…

3.9. Base period

Not applicable

4. Unit of measure

Educational expenditure – euro

5. Reference period

Year

6. Institutional mandate
6.1. Legal acts and other agreements

DIRECTLY APPLICABLE LEGAL ACTS

Regulation (EC) No 452/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 April 2008 concerning the production and development of statistics on education and lifelong learning

Commission Regulation (EU) No 912/2013 of 23 September 2013 implementing Regulation (EC) No 452/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning the production and development of statistics on education and lifelong learning, as regards statistics on education and training systems

OTHER LEGAL ACTS

NO_ENGLISH_VALUE

OTHER AGREEMENTS

United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

Statistical Office of the European Union (Eurostat)

7. Confidentiality
7.1. Confidentiality - policy

The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in § 32, § 34, § 35, § 38 of the Official Statistics Act.

7.2. Confidentiality - data treatment

The treatment of confidential data is regulated by the Procedure for Protection of Data Collected and Processed by Statistics Estonia (in Estonian). See more details on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section Õigusaktid.

8. Release policy
8.1. Release calendar

Notifications about the dissemination of statistics are published in the release calendar, which is available on the website. Every year on 1 October, the release times of the statistical database, news releases, main indicators by IMF SDDS and publications for the following year are announced in the release calendar (in the case of publications – the release month).

8.2. Release calendar access

Calendar

8.3. User access

All users have been granted equal access to official statistics: dissemination dates of official statistics are announced in advance and no user category (incl. Eurostat, state authorities and mass media) is provided access to official statistics before other users. Official statistics are first published in the statistical database. If there is also a news release, it is published simultaneously with data in the statistical database. Official statistics are available on the website at 8:00 a.m. on the date announced in the release calendar.

9. Frequency of dissemination

Annual

10. Accessibility and clarity
10.1. News release

Not published

10.2. Publications

Not published

10.3. Online database

Data are published in the statistical database at https://andmed.stat.ee/en/stat under the subject area “Social life / Education / General data of education” in the following tables:

HTG14: Expenditure by type of expenditure, source of financing, type of education and type of ownership

HTG15: Educational expenditure of private educational institutions by type of expenditure, type of education and source of financing

and under the subject area “Social life / Education / Higher education” in the following table:

HT71: Educational expenditure of public universities by source of financing

10.4. Microdata access

The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in § 33, § 34, § 35, § 36, § 38 of the Official Statistics Act. Access to microdata and anonymisation of microdata are regulated by Statistics Estonia’s procedure for dissemination of confidential data for scientific purposes.

10.5. Other

Every year on November 30th there is international data transmission to UOE (UOE - UNESCO-UIS/ OECD/ Eurostat).

10.6. Documentation on methodology

UOE (UNESCO-UIS/ OECD/ Eurostat) data collection manual

10.7. Quality documentation

Not available

11. Quality management
11.1. Quality assurance

To assure the quality of processes and products, Statistics Estonia applies the EFQM Excellence Model, the European Statistics Code of Practice and the Quality Assurance Framework of the European Statistical System (ESS QAF). Statistics Estonia is also guided by the requirements in § 7. “Principles and quality criteria of producing official statistics” of the Official Statistics Act.

11.2. Quality assessment

Statistics Estonia performs all statistical activities according to an international model (Generic Statistical Business Process Model – GSBPM). According to the GSBPM, the final phase of statistical activities is overall evaluation using information gathered in each phase or sub-process; this information can take many forms, including feedback from users, process metadata, system metrics and suggestions from employees. This information is used to prepare the evaluation report which outlines all the quality problems related to the specific statistical activity and serves as input for improvement actions.

12. Relevance
12.1. User needs

Ministry of Education and Research

12.2. User satisfaction

Since 1996, Statistics Estonia has conducted reputation and user satisfaction surveys. All results are available on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section User surveys.

12.3. Completeness

Use of administrative data ensures complete coverage and up-to-date data. The missing data collected by Statistics Estonia are imputed.

13. Accuracy and reliability
13.1. Overall accuracy

Using administrative data ensures data accuracy.

The accuracy of the data collected by Statistics Estonia is good.

13.2. Sampling error

Not applicable

13.3. Non-sampling error

The respondents may make mistakes during data entry. The data cleaners may make mistakes during data cleaning. Special cases may not fully fit into format. The definitions may be differently interpreted by people.

14. Timeliness and punctuality
14.1. Timeliness

The data are published 280–900 days after the end of the reference year (T + 280 until T + 900).

14.2. Punctuality

The data have been published at the time announced in the release calendar.

15. Coherence and comparability
15.1. Comparability - geographical

The data are comparable with those of other European Union countries, as the statistics are compiled according to the same methodology (UOE (UNESCO-UIS/ OECD/ Eurostat) data collection manual).

15.2. Comparability - over time

In table HTG14, the data are comparable across the entire time series.

In table HTG15, the data are comparable across the entire time series. Since 2019, the data on tertiary schools include research and development expenditure.

In table HT71, there is a break in the time series between 2016 and 2017. According to the methodology used to calculate educational expenditure for the years 2005–2016, research and development expenditure was not included in educational expenditure. Since 2017, the definition of educational expenditure is harmonised with the international methodology, according to which educational expenditure includes expenditure on formal education, ancillary services and research and development. Ancillary services include services provided to support the well-being of students, such as meals, school transport, dormitories, health services and sports facilities. Additionally, ancillary services may sometimes include services provided for the general public (e.g. museums, radio broadcasting, cultural programmes).

15.3. Coherence - cross domain

When comparing statistics with data from other sources, the differences in methodology should be taken into account.

15.4. Coherence - internal

The outputs of the statistical activity are coherent.

16. Cost and burden

Total time of filling in reports of the statistical activity, hours: 295

Average time of filling in the reports, hours per report:

Erakooli hariduskulutused 2,2;

Avalik-õigusliku ülikooli hariduskulutused 9,5

(data for 2022)

17. Data revision
17.1. Data revision - policy

The data revision policy and notification of corrections are described in the section Principles of dissemination of official statistics of the website of Statistics Estonia.

17.2. Data revision - practice

The published data may be revised if the methodology is modified, errors are discovered, new or better data become available.

18. Statistical processing
18.1. Source data

SURVEY DATA

Data on educational expenditure of private schools and public universities is collected with questionnaires. The samples are exhaustive.

ADMINISTRATIVE DATA

Data on educational expenditure of public schools is collected from the information system of governmental accounts of the State Shared Service Centre.

Data on students are extracted from the Estonian Education Information System (EHIS) of the Ministry of Education and Research.

DATA FROM OTHER STATISTICAL ACTIVITIES

Data of the statistical activity 21701 “Research and development” are partly used as a source for international output.

18.2. Frequency of data collection

Annual

18.3. Data collection

Data on educational expenditure not available in the information system of governmental accounts of the State Shared Service Centre is collected through eSTAT (the web channel for electronic data submission). eSTAT is also used to monitor the completion of questionnaires. The questionnaires have been designed for independent completion in eSTAT and include instructions and controls. The questionnaires and information about data submission are available on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section Questionnaires.

Data is collected with the annual official statistics questionnaires 1300 “Educational expenditures of private educational institutions” and 1301 “Educational expenditures of public universities”.

18.4. Data validation

The data are compared with the data of previous periods. All columns are checked to make sure that they have been completed as required.

18.5. Data compilation

In the case of missing or unreliable data, the estimates are imputed according to the relevant guidelines. Variables and statistical units which were not collected but which are necessary for producing the output are calculated. New variables are calculated by applying arithmetic conversion to already existing variables. This may be done repeatedly, the derived variable may, in turn, be based on previously derived new variables.

Microdata are aggregated to the level necessary for analysis. This includes aggregating the data according to the classification, and calculating various statistical measures, e.g. average, median, dispersion, etc. The values of certain indicators have been estimated taking into account the proportional distribution between levels of education based on the number of students. The collected data are converted into statistical output. This includes calculating additional indicators.

18.6. Adjustment

Not applicable

19. Comments

Not available

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