Principle 1

Education, training and life-long learning

"Everyone has the right to quality and inclusive education, training and life-long learning in order to maintain and acquire skills that enable them to participate fully in society and manage successful transitions in the labour market."

- European Pillar of Social Rights Principle 1

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Education, training, and life-long learning as a determinant of a healthy life

We live in a fast-changing world of work, affected by demographic trends and changing needs for skills and competences. Access to education and continuous training opportunities is a human right, which helps people find secure and safe work, with decent pay and opportunities for growth. 

However, not everyone is able to fully enjoy their right to education and training. People from under-served communities often have fewer opportunities to participate in meaningful training and initiatives to improve their skills and career prospects.  

Common barriers to participation in education and training

People with a lower socioeconomic status might not be not able to participate in education and training for a variety of reasons. These include lack of time and conflicting schedules, not being able to afford it, and family obligations such as caring for loved ones. Negative learning experiences in the past and health reasons also play a role, as does lack of access to the internet or a computer.  

Common barriers to participation in education and training

Working together to support learners’ needs

To improve access to education for all and use its potential to improve wellbeing, it is key to overcome the silo-approach that is still common in education. Education is often seen as a responsibility of the education sector. In reality, access and quality is actually impacted by all of society, and contributes to economic growth and productivity, employment and the population’s wellbeing.  

Experts and organisations throughout society should be involved in creating holistic policies and implementing measures that address barriers to education, such as affordability, informal care responsibilities, and limited access to digital resources.  

A joint approach creates accountability over the structural changes that are needed to reform education and training systems in Europe. It also contributes to any necessary changes to help the workforce keep up with the digital and green transition and other changes in the world of work.  

In the case of the health workforce, opportunities for training could support better preparedness for health emergencies and address critical shortages of workers. Training can also help build skills to implement health-promoting interventions that keep people from getting sick, such as social and nature-based prescribing.  

With public expenditure on education at historically low levels, it is equally important that reforms in the educational systems are matched with adequate funding.

Working together to support learners’ needs 

Education as a tool for healthier and prospering societies

As is, under-served communities often have fewer opportunities to participate in education and training, possibly forcing them to work in low-income jobs and increasing their risk of unemployment. Education is also an important determinant for poverty. 34.5% of people with lower education levels are at risk of poverty and social exclusion, compared to 10.5% of those with tertiary education. People who live in poverty generally have worse health than those who do not.  

Improving access to quality and affordable education and training can play an important role in breaking the cycle of poverty and improving health as a result. Education and training are key drivers for many societal milestones, including a person’s employment, income and economic status, as well as the extent to which they can participate in their community.  

Education and training also have a positive life-long effect on physical and mental health and wellbeing, by helping people build knowledge, skills and competences in many areas which impact health. Such skills include socioemotional skills, and health and digital literacy, as well as competences in finance, media, civic education and sustainable development. 1

Moreover, investments to improve education also offer benefits across generations. Research has found that each additional year of a parent’s education decreases the risk of their child dying before the age of 5 by 1.8%.  

Education as a tool for healthier and prospering societies 

Building healthy habits through schools

Children and adolescents spend a large proportion of their time in schools, starting from a young age. This makes schools important settings to not only provide quality and inclusive education, but to also shape the habits that influence physical and mental health early on.  

Supportive and healthy school environments also reinforce the close link between education outcomes and health status – students who feel good in school and are healthy have better school attendance levels, academic outcomes and prospects. 

“Health-promoting schools” aim to create such school settings by creating a culture and structure that help students learn important skill sets, such as socio-emotional learning, critical thinking and health literacy. They also focus on creating healthy habits in the fields of nutrition, mental health and physical activity. 

This approach also goes beyond the traditional boundaries of the health and education sectors, encouraging collaboration across different sectors (e.g. social policy, agriculture and food supply chain, active transport, environment, public order, culture and arts).  

More on health promoting schools: 

  • Schools4Health, an EU4Health-funded project, focuses on introducing and advancing the health promoting school approach.  
Building healthy habits through schools 

Supporting the digital and green transition

The shift towards a sustainable, climate neutral and digital Europe also changes the way we work, learn and live. The digital and green transition will require strong European education and training systems to equip current and future generations to thrive in a changing digital world and in new forms of work that focus on creating more sustainable economies and ways of living.  

Engaging and empowering individuals to pursue learning opportunities across their careers requires policies that create opportunities for certified training. Financial incentives can promote participation in educational initiatives and support flexible certification frameworks such as micro-credentials (which certify outcomes of short-term learning experiences). By doing so, they can boost learning and employment prospects.  

More on the digital and green skilling: 

  • The BeWell project aims to build a movement of healthcare stakeholders which support and contribute to the up-skilling and re-skilling of the European health workforce. 
Supporting the digital and green transition 
About principle 1

What does the EPSR Action Plan say?

The EPSR Action Plan sets out several overarching goals for EU Member States to be reached by 2030:

  • At least 60% of all adults should participate in training every year, and at least 80% of those aged 16-74 should have basic digital skills.

  • Regions and companies within industrial eco-systems should collaborate, share information and develop joined initiatives for skills intelligence (insights in existing skills and training needs) and up-skilling that is tailored to the individual, in line with the EU Pact for Skills. 

  • Member States should implement the policies and objectives set out in the Council Recommendation on Vocational Educational and Training. 

  • Member States should develop comprehensive policies to provide access to quality education for all and provide targeted support to disadvantaged learners. 

Where are we now?
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Where are we now?

The Social Scoreboard measures progress on the principles of the EPSR. Linked to Principle 1 on Education, training and life-long learning, the Scoreboard outlines that in the EU:

  • 53.9% of individuals aged 16-74 had basic or above basic digital skills in 2022.

  • The percentage of young people neither employment nor education and training (NEETs) (aged 15-29) decreased from 11.1% in 2014 to 9.6% in 2022.  

  • Adult participation in learning (for population aged 25-64) increased from 9.9% in 2013 to 11.9% in 2022.  

  • General government expenditure for education decreased from 4.9% in 2020 to 4.8% of GDP in 2021. 

What are public health actors doing?
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What are public health, social and education actors doing?

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The following actions taken by public health actors at (sub)national level can support the implementation of EPSR principle 10.

Click on a country to learn about initiatives taking place.

Schools4Health – “Health-promoting” schools

Funded under the EU4Health programme, Schools4Health (2023-2026) will work with approximately 16 schools to analyse, implement, and evaluate good practices in fields of healthy nutrition, physical activity, and mental health.  

These efforts will demonstrate how Health Promoting Schools and other whole-school approaches can provide children and adolescents with the right skills and supporting environments to pursue healthier lifestyles. This will ultimately improve educational outcomes and equity, address inter-related societal challenges like climate change, and boost future employability and income.  

Schools4Health

Scotland – National action to secure nourishing conditions for children 

Since 2010, the Scottish Curriculum for Excellence has helped pupils develop resilience and pragmatic skills, with literacy, numeracy, health and wellbeing being the three central areas.  

In the national improvement framework (‘the Scottish Attainment Challenge’), the focus is to use education to improve outcomes for children and young people impacted by poverty, with a focus on tackling the poverty-related attainment gap.  

In addition, ‘Getting it Right for Every Child’, is the national approach to improving outcomes and supporting the wellbeing of Scottish children and young people by offering timely and tailored help.

Scotland

National implementation of the EU Child Guarantee

In their implementation of the EU Child Guarantee, Member States also focus on education and training in schools as an important component of child development. A few examples of country-level implementation measures are: 

  • Bulgaria 
    • Improving students’ skills for learning and communicating in a multicultural environment, and increase educators’ qualifications and skills.  
  • Ireland 
    • The Digital Strategy for Schools seeks to support all students in gaining the knowledge and skills needed to navigate a digital world. Safe and effective use of digital technologies as well as inclusion are important features of the strategy. 
  • Malta 
    • The inclusion of physical and nutrition education in the national school curriculum to instill healthy skills. 
    • The ‘Opportunity Knocks’ project aims to help youth learn and enhance their skills, boosting employment and career progression.  
Implementation of the EU Child Guarantee

BeWell – skills of the future health workforce

The BeWell project (2022-2026), funded under the Erasmus+ programme, aims to build a movement of healthcare stakeholders which support and contribute to the development, implementation, and upscaling of a strategy on the up-skilling and re-skilling of the European health workforce.  

This will entail addressing the skills needed to support the digital and green transition within the health ecosystem at local, regional, national, and ultimately at the European level. The project pilots curricula and training programmes target all professionals of the health workforce.  

BeWell

National use of the EU Technical Support Instrument

The EU Technical Support Instrument helps Member States improve the capacities of their education and training systems. Examples of such investments include:  

 

  • Curriculum reform and upgrade of the teaching profession. Bulgaria, Estonia, Croatia, Lithuania, and Slovakia have mobilised the instrument to support the design of:  
    • Educator competence frameworks. 
    • Assessment tools for students and professional development; 
    • Teacher workforce forecasting models and policies to boost the attractiveness of the teaching profession. 
  • Strengthening adult education systems. Belgium, Spain, Hungary, the Netherlands and Portugal received guidance on how their adult education systems can be upgraded, by: 
    • Improving basic skills through national strategies and measures. 
    • Building forecasting systems. 
    • Designing governance models for adult training provision. 
Use of EU support

National use of EU recovery funding

EU Member States’ plans for using resilience and recovery funding include investments for education, training, and life-long learning within the context of the digital and green transition. A few examples of investments are:  

  • Austria 
    • Re-skilling and up-skilling of the workforce (including establishing an ‘education bonus’ to incentivise training for the unemployed). 
  • Belgium  
    • Improving inclusiveness of education systems, particularly training on digital skills. 
    • Training and employment of under-served groups. 
    • Improving the accessibility of the labour market and training. 
  • Slovenia 
    • Labour market resilience and inclusivity, including improving the employability of lower-skilled and older workers through training provision and more targeted active labour market policies. 
    • Strengthening competences, particularly digital skills. 
  • Spain 
    • National plan for strengthening digital skills. 
    • Strategic plan for vocational training. 
    • Modernisation and digitalisation of the education system, including early education for children 0-3 years old.
Use of EU recovery funding 
What other tools are out there?

Other tools that help implement Principle 1

There are EU policies and instruments that can help relevant actors in the field, including public health, to work together to achieve EPSR Principle 1.

More information about the EU institutions and programmes is available on EuroHealthNet's Health Inequalities Portal.

Read about EU funding and contact points
The EU Child and Youth Guarantee
The EU Child and Youth Guarantee

The EU Child Guarantee sets out recommended actions in early childhood education and care, inclusive education, and healthcare including access, affordability, and cross-sector services to address children’s health needs and potential. Similarly, the Youth Guarantee aims to provide good quality employment, continued education or traineeships. The Erasmus+ vocational training and volunteering schemes can support this. 

The EU Youth Strategy
Digital Education Plan
The European Education Area Framework
European Skills Agenda
EU financial instruments

Available resources

For more supportive policy instruments on the topic, consult our other flashcards:

More information about the EU institutions and programmes is available on EuroHealthNet’s Health Inequalities Portal.

Available EU funding

Available EU funding

Contact points for further assistance

The following contact points and resources may be useful: 

Contact points for further assistance

Technical resources

Technical resources
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Have your say

Would you like to share promising policies or practices carried out by your public health institute, which support the implementation of this EPSR principle?

Feel free to reach out to our EuroHealthNet colleague Dorota Sienkiewicz via d.sienkiewicz@eurohealthnet.eu.

What's next?

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EuroHealthNet is the Partnership of public health agencies and organisations building a healthier future for all by addressing the determinants of health and reducing inequalities. Our focus is on preventing disease and promoting good health by looking within and beyond the health system.

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