[School Story] Sweden’s School Choice System That Improved Student Achievement

In Sweden, parents receive tuition vouchers from the government. A voucher can be understood as something like a tuition certificate. If they submit it to a school, they do not have to pay tuition separately.

From the schools’ perspective, this is their lifeline. Anything beyond the small budget guaranteed by the government can be secured only by collecting vouchers from students and submitting them to the government.

The reason Sweden introduced this system in 1992 was to improve the quality of education. Under the name of public education, schools and teachers had grown complacent, and educational quality was low. If schools with poor educational quality were shunned by students and parents, this problem could be greatly reduced. In other words, students and parents, as consumers of education, needed the right to choose schools. At the same time, simply introducing a private school system could marginalize poor students, so two values had to be reconciled: competition and equal opportunity. The voucher system was introduced as the solution.

If all students are given tuition certificates and allowed to choose the school they want, poverty ceases to be an issue. In other words, because the government bears all education costs, this system is a form of public education. But from the schools’ standpoint, it is completely different. Since each school must make its own effort to attract students, it also has a strong private-sector character.

Like Korea today, Sweden previously assigned students to nearby schools, and whether schools performed well or poorly, they still received a fixed amount of funding from the government without fail.

The voucher system changed the situation completely. Even for public schools, the amount the government provides on a fixed basis accounts for only 25% of the required budget. The remaining 75% must be secured through vouchers. Schools that students do not want to attend can no longer secure their budgets. As a result, competition to attract students naturally emerged, and the quality of education improved as well. According to research by Professors Bohlmark and Lindahl of Stockholm University, student performance improved considerably after the system was introduced, and the main reason was found to be competition.

This system was originally a policy launched by the Conservative Party. Accordingly, the Social Democratic Party, which later came to power, wanted to abolish it, but because it was favored by a majority of the public, it has continued to this day. The voucher system guarantees educational opportunities for poor students while also improving the quality of education through competition among schools.

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Original title: [학교이야기] 학생의 실력을 높인 스웨덴의 학교선택제도

Author: Center for Free Enterprise (CFE)

Date: 2008-06-30

Source: https://www.cfe.org/bbs/bbsDetail.php?cid=column&pn=18&idx=10715