Educational potential (definitions):

1. Generation-long accumulated knowledge and expertise that are transferred through the education system
2. Body of knowledge, skills and expertise of an individual in general and narrow fields to practice a profession.
3. Body of knowledge, skills, expertise and opportunities offered by education for more effective functioning of public, demographic, socio-economic and scientific-innovation systems.

The educational potential can be assessed on the base of its resource component and results.

The resource component is evaluated through two groups of indicators:

1) Scale of education development.

Assessment of the scale of education development consists in spatial analysis of a network of educational institutions and quantity of staff employed in education;

2) Degree of education development.

It is assessed in two directions:

2.1) Degree of sectoral potential;

2.2) Degree of provision with services of the education sector.

For quantitative evaluation of educational potential the following indicators are analyzed:

1. Organization of teaching and learning process (facilities and resources of educational institutions);
2. Degree of provision with teaching staff and its quality;
3. Financial support of education.

Provision with educational services is estimated on the base of:

1. Quantity of trainees/students of educational institutions and vocational-technical schools per 10,000 persons;
2. Ratio of population covered with a kind of education to population that could be covered with the same kind of education;
3. Groups of indicators, such as:

3.1 quantitative indicators of educational potential (education fund (EF), aggregated index of EF, index of physical volume of the education fund, index of EF’s total value);

3.2 indicators of saturation of economic sectors with qualified staff (share of persons with higher, specialized technical and secondary education out of total quantity of employed population, factor of saturation of economic sectors with professionals, lead factor of qualified employer saturation, lead factor of higher education professionals saturation);

3.3 indicators of usage of population’s educational potential (loss of education fund due to unemployment, EF use factor).

In assessing cost-effectiveness of education as the result of educational potential the following two aspects should be considered:

1. external cost-effectiveness of education (value added created by qualified labor),
2. internal cost-effectiveness of education (characterizes efficiency of education activity).

Thus, it is necessary to use statistical analysis data for diagnostics of educational potential, particularly quantity of higher educational institutions and training organizations, number of population and students in the region, number of staff in the educational sector, and funding of the educational sector.

Sources (in Russian):
Obrazovatelniy potentsial obtshestva / Slovari i enziklopediyi na Akademike
Osobennosti diagnostiki i reformirovaniya obrazovatelnogo potentsiala / 2013

Monographs and brochures

Constructing Knowledge Societies: New Challenges for Tertiary Education (2002) 

Lifelong Learning in the Global Knowledge Economy: Challenges for Developing Countries (2003) 

Strategic Approaches to Science and Technology in Development (2003) 

Papers

Ezcurra D., Indij D. - Water Education in Schools: a holistic approach based on Integrated Water Resources Management to met Educational Goals 

Author: Rysbekov Yu. Kh., SIC ICWC