The Influence of Public Expenditures on Education on its Quality: The Case of Poland

The improvement of the quality of education is an important element for the functioning of each country. There are many controversies concerning whether the government should interfere with the education system or not, and if should, then to which level. The funding of the education is one of the major areas that the government has the possibility to influence through its decisions. Private education is on a different level of the development in different countries. However, in most countries the public education dominates over its equivalent from the private sector. Poland has to follow the recommendations set out in the ‘Strategic framework for European cooperation in education and training - Education and Training 2020’, the basis for EU-wide cooperation in education, where have been established long-term strategic objectives and benchmarks for the Member Countries to 2020. The purpose of the article is the analysis of the correlation of the changes of the amount of public expenditures and the results achieved by students up to the age of 16. The results of the Programme of International Student Assessment were taken into consideration, which examine students’ skills in three areas: reading literacy, mathematical literacy, and scientific literacy, and the results of examination at the end of lower secondary school education. Conclusions concern the relationship between the amount of public expenditures on education at NUTS5 and its influence on the results achieved by those students. Moreover, the author suggests the applications, which may result in the improvement of the quality of polish education.