Today, Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, publishes the most recent data for the EU and its Member States on achievement against the two Europe 2020 education headline targets. The Europe 2020 strategy’s target is that at least 40% of 30-34-year-olds in the 27 Member States of the European Union (EU) should have completed tertiary education by 2020. Reaching 40.3%, the EU crossed this threshold in 2019. Since 2002 when the series started at 22.5%, there has been a steady increase.
This growth pattern was even more significant for women (from 23.7% in 2002 to 45.6% in 2019) than for men (from 21.4% to 35.1%), meaning women are above and men still below the overall Europe 2020 target.