Many students not attending high school closest to home adding to inequality
More than half of Estonia's high school students do not attend the school closest to home, deepening inequality as elite schools overflow and others are left struggling.
The Foresight Center and the Ministry of Education and Research on Tuesday presented studies on high school students' school choices and academic outcomes, showing that 59 percent of students in Estonia do not attend the high school closest to their home.
Student movement is greatest in Harju and Tartu counties, where there are more schools and better transportation options. In rural areas, 49 percent of students attend the nearest high school, but even there, many commute to Harju or Tartu counties.
High schoolers on Estonia's islands move the least, as limited options on Hiiumaa and Saaremaa restrict their choices.
However, student mobility has negative side effects. Eneli Kindsiko, an expert at the Foresight Center and editor-in-chief of the Estonian Human Development Report, said that so-called "magnet schools," which attract many students from elsewhere, are becoming overcrowded, while smaller schools are losing students.
"We also need to talk about school resources. On one side, you have students from weaker socioeconomic backgrounds who cluster in smaller schools, and on the other, those schools themselves lack resources — they're short on teachers and support staff. It creates a double disadvantage... It's not one plus one equals two, but three, four or five," Kindsiko explained.
This raises the question of whether such schools' disadvantages should somehow be offset to support students who remain in their local schools. A school can either worsen or help mitigate those inequalities.
"Some kids are running a marathon in socks, while others have top coaches by their side," she said, describing the situation in Estonia's school landscape.
Kindsiko added that moving 200 kilometers away from Tallinn correlates with lower life expectancy, poorer health and lower education levels — a concerning trend. She emphasized that without addressing regional and educational inequality, Estonia risks perpetuating a vicious cycle of segregation.
Kids of highly educated and well-to-do parents studying farther from home
According to the report on high school student mobility, choosing a high school farther from home is more common among students whose parents have higher education levels and incomes. Living in the countryside significantly reduces the likelihood of attending a more distant school, said Kadi Serbak, an adviser at the Ministry of Education and Research and one of the report's authors.
"Young people whose parents have higher gross monthly salaries are more likely to study farther from home. This holds true in rural areas, small towns and cities alike. For every €1,000 increase in a mother's gross monthly salary, the likelihood of her child studying at a high school farther from home rises by a factor of 1.096," Serbak explained.
The report also found that the higher a school's average final exam results in Estonian and in both narrow and broad mathematics, the more likely it is to have students who do not attend their nearest high school.
"This clearly shows that quality matters in school choice," Serbak said.
Sandra Fomotškin, an adviser in the ministry's inclusive education department, noted that students entering smaller high schools have had lower basic school exam results than those entering larger ones.
"The trend is quite linear: the larger the school, the stronger the students' prior exam results. I want to emphasize that this doesn't show why it happens — only that students are making these kinds of choices," Fomotškin added.
When it comes to Estonian and Estonian as a second language final exams at the basic school level, the report highlights Northeast Estonia as a clear outlier, where incoming high school students have posted lower results.
More students graduate in large high schools
When comparing high schools by type of ownership, a clear pattern emerges: students entering state-run high schools tend to have stronger math results than those applying to municipal schools. Scores are also somewhat higher among students entering schools that operate solely as upper secondary institutions.
School size also plays a role in dropout rates — smaller schools see significantly more students leaving before graduation, while larger ones have a higher share of students completing their studies.
National exam results in both basic and advanced mathematics are weaker in smaller schools than in larger ones and the same pattern holds true for exams in Estonian and Estonian as a second language.
Overall student satisfaction is also higher in larger schools. The one notable exception — where the smallest schools perform best — is in providing opportunities for physical activity. However, according to Sandra Fomotškin, all schools have substantial room for improvement in this area.
Fomotškin emphasized that the knowledge and skills students bring with them to high school vary across school types. This means smaller schools are not doing a poor job — they are simply working with a different student population than large urban schools.
"Large high schools perform better than smaller ones, pure upper secondary schools perform better than full-cycle schools and private schools perform worse than municipal high schools," Fomotškin summarized.
Eneli Kindsiko noted that, compared to other European countries, Estonia's school network is exceptionally dense — particularly at the upper secondary level, where other nations often have far fewer schools. To reduce inequality, she said, Estonia should rely on existing educational data and analytics to make well-informed policy decisions.
"In rural areas, we cannot just replicate urban school models — we need new approaches," Kindsiko said.
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Editor: Karin Koppel, Marcus Turovski
