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Pursuant to Republic Act 10625, also known as the Philippine Statistical Act of 2013, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) is mandated to prescribe and maintain uniform statistical standards and classification systems to harmonize and ensure comparability of government statistics based on international standards/guidelines, such as the United Nations international standard classification systems.

One of the national standard classification systems being maintained by the PSA is the Philippine Standard Classification of Education (PSCED). The PSCED is a detailed classification of all educational levels in the Philippine educational system. It is based upon two principal criteria, namely (1) level of education, and (2) subject-matter content of the study. It is patterned after the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) developed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) for the purpose of assembling, compiling, and presenting education statistics, both nationally and internationally.

So far, the Philippines has prepared the following classifications of education patterned after the corresponding international standard classifications of education:

Philippine Standard Classification of EducationInternational Standard Classification of Education
1994 PSCED1976 ISCED
1997 PSCED    
2008 PSCED1997 ISCED

2017 Philippine Standard Classification of Education

The 2017 PSCED is the latest version of the PSCED which is aligned after the 2011 ISCED and 2013 ISCED Fields of Education (ISCED-F) developed by UNESCO.

The first draft of the 2017 PSCED was initially prepared by the PSA through the Statistical Classifications Division (SCD) of the Standards Service (SS) under the Censuses and Technical Coordination Office (CTCO). A series of consultation meetings to review the draft was conducted with the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) and Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA).

The revised draft was then reviewed by the Technical Working Group on Education Classification (TWGEC) chaired by the Commission on Higher Education (CHED). The TWGEC is composed of the following members: Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), Department of Education (DepEd), Department of Labor and Employment - Bureau of Local Employment (DOLE-BLE), Department of Science and Technology - Science Education Institute (DOST-SEI), National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA), Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), Professional Regulations Commission (PRC), UNESCO National Commission of the Philippines (UNACOM) and the PSA. The TWGEC then submitted the revised draft to the PSA Interagency Committee on Statistical Standards and Classifications (IACSSC) for endorsement to the PSA Board.

The PSA Board approved the 2017 PSCED through PSA Board Resolution No. 13, Series of 2017 for adoption by all concerned government agencies and instrumentalities.