The Basic education in the Republic of Belarus is in a stable process of permanent development and improvement. It is based on the traditions of the former Soviet Union’s school and takes into account the trends in European education and world democratic achievements.

It is possible to mention the following main features of basic education in Belarus:

wide scale children involving in pre-school education;

whole children involving in primary and basic education that is obvious and free of charge;

equal state requirements to the level of education for every school;

no discrimination for race, gender, nationality, religion or geography of pupil;

state financial support of education;

stable development;

start of the secondary school reform since 1998 with the aim to transform the school system to 12 years of study;

centralized governance the school system through the pyramid Ministry – regional sections for education in regional administration – district sections for education in district administration;

budget low limit for education by law.

INTRODUCTION

 The decision of the World Conference on Education for All (Jomtien, Thailand, 1990) foresaw the need for end-of-decade assessment of state and progress of education. The Conference established The International Consultative Forum on Education for All (EFA Forum) to proved the EFA 2000 Assessment as a comprehensive review of policies concerning basic education. This will provide an opportunity to refocus attention on basis education and reinvigorate efforts to meet basic learning needs.

It was assumed that every country in the world will participate in the EFA 2000 Assessment through contribution of a national report in a final total document. Governments were strongly encouraged to set up as soon as possible a national assessment group with a technical subgroup. The Ministry of Education should be in the centre of the subgroup and involves different local authorities, the media, and the voluntary and private organisations concerned with the basic education. Activity of the subgroups is supported by UNDP, UNESCO, UNFPA, UNICEF and World Bank.

The recommendation to establish EFA Assessment group and to designate a national assessment co-ordinator in June-July 1998 was done in the Mid-decade Review of EFA (1995-1996). Equipped with appropriate guides these groups and co-ordinators already in December 1998 had to prepare a preliminary draft of their national EFA 2000 assessment report. The final report to be submitted to the EFA Forum in September 1999.

Belarus decided to contribute to EFA process in May 1999. This moment only a national co-ordinator was appointed. But other steps never were done. As a result because of shortage of time and absence of funding the only published statistical data became available for use in the national report. These data were mainly collected from annual reference books that are issued by the Center of Calculations and Analysis of the Ministry of Education, from annual reports and different analytical materials by National Institute of Education. Some figures were extracted from the reference books issued by Ministry of Statistics and UNESCO.

The voluntary position of the national co-ordinator was occupied by vice-rector of the National Institute for Higher Education (NIHE) in accordance with the decision of the Ministry of Education. He participated in the regional working meeting on the EFA 2000 in Bucharest in May 1999 for the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. So late including of the Belarus in the EFA process and impossibility to find any additional funding in the budget of Ministry of Education limited abilities of the national co-ordinator and the authors very strongly. Among weak points there was absence of the national commission the functions of which nobody executed. As well a list of the working group participants was limited with volunteers only. Under this conditions and non obligatory participation of different ministries’ and organisations’ staff shortage of available information sources and original data made disabled in a certain part the excel program that was so carefully prepared by UNESCO. The authors were forced to replace some formulas in the program to use non-standard abilities and methods of calculation. To clarify the situation with basic education in Belarus for readers of this report a lot of different data are included in the text. Also, the standard tables on 1998 only are included in the printed brochure (section Indicators). Different standard excel tables are available in electronics form only. This information is on NIHE’s web site htt://www.nihe.unibel.by and it is a subject of permanent renewal. The authors seem to be lucky in calculation of some indicators in accordance with UNESCO’s guides when the available information was sufficient.

The Republic of Belarus is a new independent state in the Western part of the former Soviet Union. The territory of it is equal to 208 thousand square km. There are more than 10 million inhabitants. Belarus shares border with five states: the Russian Federation (33 % of border), the Ukraine (33 %), Lithuania (13 %), Poland (13 %) and Latvia (5 %).

There are the representatives of 118 nations and national minorities are living on the territory of the Republic. Native Belorussians make up 77.9 % of the population, according to the census of 1989. Over 2 million people of Belorussian origin are living in the USA, Canada, Australia, France, Argentina, Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia and other countries.

Administratively Belarus is divided into 6 regions (oblast) and yet further into 118 districts (rayon). There are 102 towns, 109 settlements, 25 districts in towns and 1447 village Soviets. The city Minsk, is the capital of the Republic. It has a population of more than 1.7 million people. Minsk has the status of an independent administrative unit that is equal to the status of a region.

On July 27, 1990 the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus adopted a resolution on the State sovereignty. The Republic made its first step towards the establishment of a democratic state and system of government through adoption of the Constitution of the Republic of Belarus on March 15, 1994. In July of 1994 the first democratic elections took place and first elected president came in his office. On November 24, 1996 the Republican Referendum adopted modifications and supplements to the Constitution of the Republic of Belarus of 1994. It strengthened new social, economic, political and public realities of Belorussian society in transition.

Belarus is the founding members of the UN and UNESCO. Belarus is an active participant of more than 60 international organisations, the Republic signed more than 170 international agreements, contracts, conventions and protocols. Of great importance nowadays is becoming the Union of Belarus with Russia.

Before the break-up of the Soviet Union Belarus was among the most successful republics of the USSR, in both economic and social terms. Among the 15 republics of the former USSR Belarus was ranked well on many key socio-economic indicators: national income per capita (4-th position), industrial production (3-rd), agricultural production (2-rd), monetary income of the population (1-st), and average life expectancy (3-rd). In 1994 Belarus was ranked 40-th of the 173 countries rated on the UNDP Human Development Index, and was classified as a country of high human development. Only the Baltic States and the Russian Federation, among former Soviet countries were ranked higher.

Realisation of economic and social transformation program in the Republic of Belarus to a great extend depends on human factors, educational level of the nation. It makes more acute and shaper the problem of spiritual revival, significant promotion of general and professional culture of people, joining all and everyone the achievements of world and native material and spiritual culture. Social, economic and political reforms in Belarus demand the educational sphere to become the priority line of state policy in complex crises like conditions of transition period. Such priority role of education system must in all ends play the lending role in transformation of the Republic of Belarus in developed, democratic and technologically high state and become the warrant and source of its stable social and economic development.

The State policy of the Republic of Belarus in the field of education is based on ensuring free development, prosperity and prosperity of each citizen, strengthening productive, intellectual and creative powers of nation. It is aimed at formation and improvement of high qualitative national education system, state and public support of its priority development as an important factor of scientific and technical, cultural and spiritual progress, promotion of national sovereignty.

According to the latest programme document "Main Directions of the National Education System Development" adopted by the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus on April 12,1999 it is defined that education should become a key to the real freedom of personality, stable development of democracy in the law abiding State, increase of the economy efficiency. This new mission is based on

- protection and development of the best features of the existing national education system,

- outstripping and appropriate functioning of the education system in the period of social and cultural transformation,

- formation of the system of education and upbringing in accordance with the goals of a new stage of the Belarusian society development.

To make education of more prestige is among the main aims of nowadays. This demands to introduce the concept of education as a basic condition of development in the public consciousness as well as to recognise the education among the priorities of the state policy. It should be clear to everybody that investment in education is the most effective one.

The successful achievement of the mission is based on the following principles

• accessibility of education,
• equal access to education,
• compulsory primary and basic education,
• free education in the state establishments,
• no discrimination of race, gender, nationality, religion, income or origin of a pupil,
• unity of aims for general educational and education of personality,
• meeting individual educational requirements according to personal features and abilities,
• plurality of educational establishments’ types,
• continuity of the education,
• humanistic and fundamental base of education,
• stable and progressive development of the national education system,
• use of domestic and international experience of development and reforming,
• step-by-step reformation, correction of the goals and methods in accordance with the achieved results,
• active public participation in reforming and its efficiency control.

The main legislative documents regulating currently the national education system activities are the following:

the Constitution of the Republic of Belarus of 1994 with modifications and supplements that were adopted by the Republican Referendum on the 24^th of November 1996;

the Laws "On Education in the Republic of Belarus", "On languages", "On the Rights of Children", "On the Rights of National Minorities", "On the Common Lines of State Youth Policy in the Republic of Belarus" and other legislative and normative documents.

There is a developed system of regulation based on the mentioned above legislation in Belarus. This includes a lot of statements, instructions, orders, standards, etc. issued by the Ministry of Education. As a rule, these documents come into force after national wide discussion to meet the interests of all the participants of educational process.

Pursuant to Article 14 of the Law of the Republic of Belarus "On Education in the Republic of Belarus" the national education system is based on continuity and includes the following components: pre-school education; general secondary education; out-of-school education forms; vocational education; higher education; post-graduate education; skills up-grading and staff retraining; adult education. The contemporary education system includes various types of public and private educational institutions. There are pre-school (kindergartens, crèches) and general educational (elementary, basic and secondary schools, gymnasiums, lyceums) institutions, out-of-school specialised and boarding schools (children’s homes, boarding schools, penitentiary institutions for under-age infringers of the law, etc.), vocational and higher education professional training schools, colleges, specialised higher educational institutions, universities and academies, skill improvement and retraining institutes, subordinate scientific and methodological institutions among them. At the beginning of 1998/99 school year the national education system structure covered 4500 pre-school institutions, 4783 secondary schools, 249 vocational schools, 151 state special secondary and 57 state and non-state higher educational institutions, over 100 skill up-grading and staff retraining institutions for life long education. Mostly, secondary schools provided elementary and basic education. Separated schools for these two starting stages exist mainly in rural side. In the educational sphere (besides skill improvement and retraining institutions) studied over 2.1 million of pupils and students and worked about 200 thousand of teachers. In total it employs about 400 thousand of specialists that is 10 % of the active labour force of the country.

The current reform of the Belarusian system of education assumes to develop every part of the system on the base of the united educational policy. In accordance with this intention in the "Main Directions of the National System of Education Development" the special aims for these parts of the system are stated.

The document proclaims creation of the optimal conditions for physical and psychological development of a child with due regard to age and individual features in the system of pre-school education. This is to provide a high value of childhood as well as a high level preparedness and equal start ability to further education. It is necessary to save and develop the state system of pre-school establishments, to increase plurality of such establishments’ types, to involve the family in the process of education, to change the content and technology of pre-school education, to make a rush to preliminary school more comfortable for children, to improve child healthcare system. The rural pre-school education and upbringing system development is among the first level problems.

At the level of secondary education the efforts should be directed to creation of the optimum conditions for preparedness of the young generation for full value life in the changing world of the harmoniously developed individualities who know basic of national and world culture. The average educational level of population will rise. To achieve this goal the structure and content of secondary education will be enhanced; the system of patriotic, civil and moral education will be established. Compulsory basic education will include 4-year preliminary level and 6-year basic level. Full secondary education requires additional 2-year study at school.

Special education system serves to children with different disabilities who can not attend a conventional school. It provides them with equal opportunities to study and to have a profession. The staff of these schools does all their best to make children integrated into all the public affairs without any discrimination.

This is out-of-school education that is to provide all-round meeting of the educational requirements of children and their parents. No one talent can be missed. This system offers also some additional healthcare abilities, enhancing in life skills, handicraft, music, sports etc. The network of out-of-school education establishments will be developed; the conditions for young people activity will be created. There is a problem of Chernobyl’s children healthcare at the first line of the State actions.

Vocational education must meet the requirements of young people in profession and the demands of the labour market. It is possible in Belarus to start vocational study just after graduation from basic or secondary school. Anyway, vocational establishments offer classes of secondary education. This system has to become more effective to serve the needs of new social and economic conditions. The transformation of secondary education on 12-year basis enforces the vocational schools to meet new demands.

The Republic of Belarus saves the system of special secondary vocational education that provides graduates with qualification of "technic" that is between qualifications of workers and engineers. The system includes technicums and colleges establishments with two years training program for the people who graduated from a secondary school. Some establishments offer earlier enrolment for the people who have got basic education and can continue secondary education in parallel with vocational training. The main problems of this system are in old-fashioned steering and weak co-operation with higher education establishments. To overcome the difficulties there will be established a new system of educational standards and some courses will be adopted to university’s ones. This will permit the access of "technics" to the second or even third grade of an affiliated higher education establishment. That idea is realised completely in higher colleges that are incorporated simultaneously in the special secondary vocational education and higher education systems and that are strong linked with their supervisors.

The system of higher education needs transformation also. It should be directed more than earlier to meet population requirement, it should be better managed and exercise more autonomy and academic freedoms. The system development will come through legislation and regulation enhancement. For example, law on the system of university ranks, structure of the higher education levels, academic freedoms and university autonomy will be established. The establishments of higher education will become the centres for lifelong education. The system of enrolment will be revised to provide more fair access to universities. Research in universities will be supplied with more effective financial and equipment support. This will be also better co-ordinated with industry requirements and basic investigations in National Academy of Science.

New spirit must instil into post-graduate courses’ system to make it more effective and attractive. In a part the problem could be solved through intensification of international scientific co-operation and academic mobility. Another action is a special financial support of young scientists’ research projects through the system of the state grants as well as opportunity to provide young scientists with more abilities to publish the results.

Lifelong education system in Belarus is the most diverse among different parts of the national system of education. It covers all the levels of education and informal education. There are a lot of non-state investments in this sphere. Except the traditional staff retraining and requalification it includes now new branches for unemployed and retired military officers. Just in this system is though a leader in the way of education for small business and innovation spheres.

Education of personality in the system of education should be enhanced too. It must provide education in general and professional culture, in moral values, in environment and health life, in patriotism, in respect to every business, in citizen’s conscious position etc. This supposes development of curricula and more attaching attention to out-of-class establishments and organisation.

The text is based on the official document "(Not Traduction) . 1999. – 24 ?." adopted by the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus on April 12, 1999 (Statement N 500).

National wealth, as covered by the current statistics, is composed of accumulated material goods produced by labour that are disposed by the society at the moment. In accordance with the economic purposes, the national wealth is divided in the following groups: fixed assets, material circulating assets, and households' property.

Fixed assets are defined as part of the national wealth produced in processes of production that is used repeatedly, or continuously, in an invariable material form during long time in the economy, transferring gradually its value to the goods and services produced.

Material circulating assets are an important part of the national wealth of the country, its most mobile and renewable component. These cover productive stores, work in progress, finished products and goods for resale, material reserves. What makes the material circulating assets particular, is that they, participating in one production cycle, change their material form, fully transferring their value to the value of goods and services produced of those.

Households' property includes personal property accumulated by households classified by purposes (fabrics, clothing, footwear, furniture, domestic equipment and appliances, implements, instruments, books, individual transport facilities, etc.)

The System of National Accounts used in the Republic of Belarus in based on the concepts of the 1993. It is compiled in view of peculiar organisation and functioning of an economy in transition which is under transformation to market orientation. The SNA provides a comprehensive accounting framework to compile aggregate indicators relating to economic development, highlighting production, incomes and outlays and their interrelationship. Each stage has its own special account or a group of accounts. Thus, it enables to monitor the total flows of goods and services produced, as well as value added, starting from the initial production stage to the final use stage.

Goods and services account is a special summary table. It consists of two parts. On the resources side the output and imports of goods and services, taxes on products and import subsidies on products are recorded; on the uses side consumer expenditures on goods and services (intermediate and final), gross fixed capital formation, changes in inventories, and exports are recorded.

Production account records directly linked to the production process transactions. In this account the value added is defined, which is the basis for calculating the GDP (GDP), a main aggregate of the development of the economy. At the stage of use, GDP is calculated as the sum of final consumption of goods and services, gross formation and net exports excluding imports.

Output is the value of goods and services produced in the economy during a year. Output of goods includes such branches as industry, agriculture, forestry, construction, other goods-producing branches. Output of services includes services of transport, communications, trade, material supply housing, public utilities, culture, health care, bank service etc.

Gross value added is calculated at the level of branches of the economy as the value of output of goods and services less the value of intermediate consumption. The term "Gross" means, that the value added includes the value of fixed capital consumed in the process of production.

Taxes on products include the items whose rates directly depend on the value of goods produced and services rendered. Taxes on products include value added tax (VAT), excise, fuel tax, etc. Taxes on imports are those levied on imported goods and services.

The term "Net" means that taxes are shown excluding related subsidies. GDR from the production side is obtained by adding together values added by branch. GDP is calculated at market prices, i.e. includes taxes on products and import less subsidies on products. It is one of the most important indicators of the SNA that displays the final result of the production activity both in material production and non-material services.

Generation of income account is a constituent element of primary distribution of income accounts. It reflects primary incomes payable by resident institutional units directly engaged in the process of production of goods and services. An institutional unit is considered to be resident within a country when it has a centre of economic interest in that territory, i.e. is engaged or is going to get engaged in some economic activities or transactions during a long period, usually assimilated to one year.

Other taxes on production consist of all taxes, except taxes on products, payable by enterprises in connection with their participation in the production process. The rates of these taxes do not directly depend on the volume and profitability of production. They do not include any taxes on profit or other incomes received by enterprises. Other taxes on production include: taxes on use of natural resources (environment tax), payments for land (land tax), licenses, state duties and levies payable by enterprises and organisations, real estate tax, extraordinary Ghernobyl mitigation tax.

Public educational establishments are free from the most part of actual taxes. Sometimes that bonus covers even enterprises established in share with their capital.

Gross (or net) operating surplus of the economy is the part of value added which remains with producers after deducting outlays related to the remuneration of employees and taxes on production. The terms "gross" and "net" in this case show if this indicator includes or excludes consumption of fixed capital in the process of production. Referring to "unincorporated enterprises" owned by households this category is called "Gross mixed income", because it reflects both remuneration of work done by the owner of enterprise and enterpreneural income.

Allocation of primary income account is the second constituent of the primary distribution of income accounts. It shows how incomes obtained from the production activity or property are distributed among resident institutional units or sectors.

Property incomes include incomes receivable or payable by institutional units in connection with putting the financial assets, land, and other non-financial assets (minerals and other natural resources, patents, licenses, etc) at the disposal of other institutional units.

Primary incomes are received by institutional units as a result of their participation in production or from property. It is defined as the difference between all primary incomes receivable and payable by resident units. At the national level the balance of primary incomes makes gross income, i.e. before deduction of consumption of fixed capital, equal to Gross National Income (GNI).

Secondary distribution of income account reflects the transformation of the balance of primary incomes by sectors into their disposable incomes, as a result of receipts and payments of current transfers.

Disposable income is defined as income left at institutional units' disposal for final consumption and saving. It is equal to the GNI less income payable as current transfers plus current receivable transfers. The sum of disposable incomes of all resident institutional units is equal to Gross National Disposable Income. Use of disposable income account shows how households, general government and non-profit institutions serving households distribute their disposable income between final consumption expenditures and saving.

Final consumption expenditures consist of final consumption expenditures of households, general governmental final consumption expenditures on individual goods and services and collective services, and also final consumption expenditures of non-profit institutions serving households. Such grouping shows what the sector pays for final consumption. Final consumption expenditures of households include outlays for purchasing consumer goods and services from all trading enterprises and city markets, non-organised trade (street vendors), from public service, passenger transport, communications establishments, hotels, commercial Institutions of culture, health care and education. There are also other consumption of goods and services that are produced for own use (agricultural produce of personal subsidiary plots, imputed services of owner-occupied dwellings), and received as labour remuneration.

General governmental final consumption expenditures on individual goods and services consist of outlays of government institutions on consumer goods and services intended for personal consumption. Such outlays are funded from the State budget and extra-budget funds.

General governmental final consumption expenditures on collective services are different from the previous ones. They include services rendered by enterprises and organisations that are compensated from the State budget. Such services meet needs of community in general and these do not take into account individual households (expenditures on defence, government, roads, scientific activity financed from the State budget and extra-budget funds, communal services and services of institutions serving agriculture).

Final consumption expenditures of non-profit institutions serving households are outlays of public associations on consumer goods and services provided free to households. Also here included are services provided free by enterprises and organisations to their employees in education, health care, culture.

Principles of valuation. Valuation in the SNA is made at current prices used at the moment of transactions. Production and use of GDP is valued at current market prices ruling in the period of production or use of products. In order to eliminate the influence of various taxes and subsidies in different branches of the economy on the structure of production and generation of income, indicators by branches are valued at basic prices. Basic price is the amount receivable by the producer for a unit of a good or service excluding any taxes on products and imports, but including subsidies on products and imports. Non-market goods and services are valued at market prices of similar goods and services sold at the market when it is possible to determine these or, when market prices are not available, by expenditures on production (specifically, services of government and non-profit institutions are valued in this way). Alt indicators at current prices, including changes in inventories and consumption of fixed capital, are valued at average prices of the accounting period.

In the SNA output, intermediate consumption, operating surplus and increase in inventories are calculated, excluding holding gains (losses), which are defined as the value of products created due to changes in prices during the period when the products were held in stocks. Under the conditions of high inflation holding gains (losses) could be sizeable.

Revaluation at constant prices (of previous year) is made for GDP both from the production side and from the use side. The indicators of the production of GDP are re-valued at constant prices with the double deflation method where the value added at constant prices is the difference between the value of output and the value of intermediate consumption at constant prices. To re-value the indicators of use of GDP at constant prices, relevant price indices (consumer price index, capital investments price index, etc.) and physical indicators were applied. Revaluation at constant prices is made by two methods:

• data deflation at current prices for the accounting period with corresponding price indices,

• data extrapolation at current prices for the base year with quantum indices of the corresponding indicators.

GDP deflator is the ratio of GDP at current prices to GDP at constant prices of the previous period. Unlike the goods and services prices index, the GDP deflator measures change In compensation of employees, operating surplus (including mixed income), and consumption of fixed assets arisen from changes in prices and nominal net taxes.

These expenditures concern to allocation and use of monetary resources of the state for sectoral, goal-oriented and territorial purposes. Expenditures for financing of branches of the economy are funds assigned for branches of material production, housing and municipal and personal services. The bulk of budgetary funds is spent for financing of capital investments in government sector of economy and for different subsidies to enterprises. Expenditures for social and cultural measures enable the State to develop the system of education, to finance culture, to satisfy the needs of population in medical care, to implement social security measures, to increase the level of social welfare. Expenditures for social and cultural measures are also undertaken by enterprises and organizations, by the Fund for social security of population, trade unions etc.

Financial statistics of enterprises contains indicators reflecting financial status of enterprises. Data collection is carried out through state statistical reporting forms and bookkeeping balances.

Pre-school establishments (which function not less than 10 months in a year) provide care, nursing, improvement of sanitary conditions, bringing up, and training of children aged from 1 to 7 years.

Among pupils of day-time general education schools there are persons who study in primary, basic, secondary schools, gymnasiums, lyceums, colleges, and schools for mentally and physically retarded children. Gymnasiums and lyceums are included into secondary general education schools. The education programmes of gymnasiums comprise compulsory learning of the Belorussian and Russian languages, one or two foreign languages, national and world history and culture, literature, and other subjects. Lyceums provide secondary education combined with additional training in a relevant fields of professions.

Colleges are included into secondary specialized educational establishments. Colleges provide advanced secondary specialized education including subjects of higher educational programmes. They do not belong to basic school system.

Cohort of pupils of day-time general education schools cover persons educated in primary, basic, secondary schools, gymnasiums, lyceums, colleges, and schools for children having mental and physical deviations.

In accordance with the Law "On Education in the Republic of Belarus" the following educational qualifications of general education are established: basic education for persons who completed 9-year programme in general educational institutions, secondary general education for persons who completed 11-year (12-year in new versus) programme.

National system of education in Belarus is illustrated with the diagram 1.

OBJECTIVES AND AIMES OF EFA

The assembly and analyses of relevant data and qualitative information in the field of pre-school, primary and basic education is the main objective of the EFA 2000 Assessment program. The results should be useful for policy-makers, planners and managers both within and outside the government. It will also provide an opportunity to refocus attention on basic education that is a subject of the started in 1998 reform of education.

According UNESCO Guidelines it was necessarily to calculate a set of 18 core EFA indicators that may be used to describe the main components of national system of basic education. Most of the necessary data are collected regularly but in general they are in primary school statistical reports only. Sometimes it was impossible to disaggregate synthetic data or put them on the same basis. That makes so difficult to rich high accuracy in indicators due to forced use of estimations instead of official statistical figures. Moreover, it was found a lot of variants in different sources of official information that limits the accuracy of indicators on the level of a few percents.

The authors of this report tried to use recent, reliable and comprehensive data. If some of them did not meet all the criteria they, nevertheless, were useful to illustrate an aspect or situation.

Data on financial resources for education were refered to actual expenditures when it was possible. However, it can be clear that the figures have the synthetic nature because they combine data from republic and local budgets. Also, voluntary contribution of parents and partners was not taken into account under reliable sources of information absence.

It was not paid high attention to gender analyses. The reasons are 1) absence of information and 2) absence of gender discrimination in education. So, for basic education all the figures for male and female are equal to general ones. All the differences are due to real gender content of population of the certain age.

The made analyses of the sources of statistical information produced one more aim. We mean the necessity to develop the system of educational information collection to make this system more reliable and meeting international requirements.