Croatia: OECD accession process reaches key skills policy milestones in education

Progress despite challenges

The OECD’s 2025 review of Education and Skills in Croatia acknowledged the country’s efforts to strengthen education and skills over the past two decades. While around 70% of upper secondary students are enrolled in vocational programmes, these pathways are often viewed as lower-status and disconnected from labour market needs. Curricula have been outdated, employer engagement is limited, as was basic and transversal skills development. As a result, many students face lengthy transitions into employment, and tertiary dropout rates are high, especially among vocational graduates. Adult participation in learning is also alarmingly low, especially for disadvantaged groups. Barriers include affordability, limited programme flexibility, poor geographic access – particularly in rural areas – fragmented governance, scarce employer incentives and a weak lifelong learning culture. These challenges are particularly urgent as Croatia faces structural headwinds: one of the fastest-shrinking populations in Europe, regional economic imbalances, and widespread skills shortages that threatened productivity and innovation.

Strategic reforms underway

In response, Croatia has launched ambitious reforms, such as introducing new modular VET curricula and establishing regional centres of competence to improve skills relevance in VET. In adult learning, the introduction of an adult education voucher scheme, supported by EU funds, is a key innovation. It aims to reduce cost barriers and boost participation among working-age adults, particularly in response to skills shortages and the green and digital transitions.

OECD endorsement and recommendations

The OECD confirmed that Croatia’s education and skills policies are broadly aligned with those of member countries and provided a set of strategic recommendations to further strengthen the vocational and lifelong learning system:

• Diversify post-secondary qualifications (ISCED 4 and 5), including short-cycle tertiary and professional non-tertiary programmes, to support smoother school-to-work transitions.
• Empower VET providers to collaborate more closely with employers, align curricula with local labour market needs, and expand work-based learning.
• Adopt a national lifelong learning strategy, supported by sustainable financing mechanisms such as individual learning accounts and employer incentives.
• Expand and better target financial support and promote learning opportunities for disadvantaged learners, alongside improved guidance and Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) pathways.
• Enhance governance and data systems by strengthening coordination, improving tracking of learner outcomes, and supporting evidence-based decision-making.

As Croatia works toward OECD accession and confronts significant demographic and economic challenges, these measures aim to help Croatia build a more inclusive, responsive and future-ready education and skills system. The OECD recommendations also reflect current national priorities for VET and lifelong learning, building on the success of the ongoing initiatives, such as VET curricula reform and vouchers for lifelong learning.

Read more

• OECD (2025). Education and Skills in Croatia. Reviews of National Policies for Education, OECD Publishing, Paris.
• Cedefop, & ReferNet (2025). Timeline of VET policies in Europe (2024 update) [online tool].