Issue Transformation of the education system in a shrinking society

Summary

Low fertility and a shrinking school-age population are increasing the number of depopulating areas, accelerating school mergers and closures and deepening educational conflict between regions. Restructuring schools is expected to create a variety of new education-finance needs. Even as the population falls, the preference for capital-region schools is intensifying regional gaps, unequal opportunities and school hierarchies, making the decline of provincial education a major policy challenge. Universities face falling student numbers and concentration in the capital region, with regional institutions closing departments, halving quotas and shutting dormitories. A shrinking working-age population is also depressing participation in lifelong learning even as providers increase, which the survey reads as a demand-side effect of demographic change.