Education in the Dominican Republic

In the Dominican Republic, education is free and compulsory at the elementary level, and free but non-mandatory at the secondary level. It is divided into four stages:

• preschool education (Nivel Inicial);
• primary education (Nivel Básico);
• secondary education (Nivel Medio);
• higher education (Nivel Superior).

Literacy rates and school participation in the Dominican Republic has risen over the past years. Through these efforts, women have reported fast upward movement in social class partially due to increased education.^[1] There have been numerous efforts to evaluate teachers, students, and facilities through examinations. Teachers in the Dominican Republic rate higher in multiple aspects than other countries in Latin America, however, still rank below many other countries.^[2]

The school conditions vary based on whether the school is private, polytechnic, or public non-polytechnic, with decreasing quality facilities respectively. A very similar trend has been found in student performance.^[3] Despite advances in the education system, there are still issues in regards to gender inequality, participation in the education system, and involvement of outside organizations.

The Human Rights Measurement Initiative (HRMI)^[4] finds that the Dominican Republic is fulfilling only 75.5% of what it should be fulfilling for the right to education based on the country's level of income.^[5] HRMI breaks down the right to education by looking at the rights to both primary education and secondary education. While taking into consideration the Dominican Republic's income level, the nation is achieving 79.8% of what should be possible based on its resources (income) for primary education but only 71.3% for secondary education.^[5]