Overview of Education System

The Education and Youth Affairs Bureau (Direcção dos Serviços de Educação e Juventude, or DSEJ) is the government department responsible for developing, directing, coordinating, administering, and evaluating nontertiary education in Macao. It also is responsible for a range of societal organizations involving young people and for supporting youth associations and similar organizations.

The Fundamental Law of Nontertiary Education was formally promulgated in December 2006. Having a high quality nontertiary education system was considered essential for building and developing studentsʼ achievements. It also provides an effective support framework for sustaining and furthering the outcomes of kindergarten, primary, and secondary education and enables nontertiary education establishments in Macao to “keep improving and developing.”8

Alongside the promulgation of the Fundamental Law of Nontertiary Education, the administrative regulations of the Free Education Subsidy System as well as the Tuition Subsidy System were published in the same year. These enactments helped lay a solid foundation for perfecting an education system meeting the needs of the development of Macao SAR.9

Macao was the first region in Greater China to provide 15 years of free education. Since the 2007–2008 academic year, free education has been extended to cover all formal education: three years of kindergarten, six years of primary, three years of junior secondary, and three years of senior secondary schooling.

Nontertiary education in Macao is classified into two types: formal and continuing. Formal education comprises kindergarten, primary schooling, secondary schooling, and special education, whereas continuing education comprises family education, recurrent education, community education, vocational training, and other education activities. Vocational-technical education, which may be implemented as part of formal education or recurrent education, is offered only at the senior secondary level. The Macao school system comprises public and private schools, with a free education network composed of public schools offering formal education and most subsidized private schools providing free education.

Private schools in Macao can be classified into two types: those following the local education system and those following a nonlocal education system. Nonprofit private schools that follow the local education system may apply for entry into the free education network. The government encourages schools to develop their own characteristics and style in terms of mission, curriculum development, and teaching mode and deliberately supports the development of a diverse school system to nurture more talent for society.

According to DSEJ statistics, there were 77 schools in Macao in the 2015–2016 academic year, of which 10 were public and the remaining 67 were private. Among the 67 private schools, 64 offered formal education and three offered only recurrent education. Among the 74 schools that offered formal education (10 public and 64 private schools), 64 were under the “free of charge” education umbrella and the remaining 10 operated within the “paid” education sector.

During the 2015–2016 academic year, 74,550 students received nontertiary education, with 72,613 of them receiving formal education. Of these students, 16,789 (22.5 percent) attended kindergarten, 26,436 (35.5 percent) attended primary schools, 28,745 (38.6 percent) attended secondary schools, 1,065 (1.4 percent) received vocational-technical education, and 643 (0.9 percent) were enrolled in institutions for children with special educational needs. Some 1,937 students received recurrent education, including 87 primary school students (0.1 percent) and 1,850 secondary school students (2.5 percent).10

Macao has 10 tertiary educational institutions, of which four are public and six private. In the 2015–2016 academic year, there were 2,015 teaching staff and 31,970 registered students in these institutions. Some 267 programs were in operation, including doctorate, masters, and bachelor degree programs, diploma and higher diploma programs, and postgraduate certificate programs. In addition, overseas institutions were granted approval in 2015 to offer 41 tertiary educational programs.11