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Israeli teenagers have performed more poorly than ever before in an international assessment of maths, reading and science, falling further behind the average of developed countries.
Israel ranked 43rd globally in the 2025 ranking of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa), published on Tuesday. The country has slipped from 38th place in 2022, and now sits in 33rd position among developed countries, down from 31st previously.
The assessment is the world’s largest international comparative survey of 15-year-old students, “assessing the extent to which they have acquired key knowledge and skills essential for full participation in social and economic life”, measuring their ability to use their reading, maths and science knowledge and skills to meet real-life challenges.
Israeli pupils scored 433 in maths, compared with an OECD average of 463 while in reading they achieved 436 compared with 461, In science, Israeli children scored 442 in science, 40 points below the 482 average.
All three results marked Israel’s lowest scores since it began participating in Pisa, which takes place every three years, while the country suffered the second-largest overall decline among participating nations, behind Latvia.
Only 54 per cent of Israeli pupils reached the OECD’s minimum proficiency level in maths, compared with an international average of 65 per cent. The equivalent figures were 59 per cent in reading and 60 per cent in science.
Israeli Education Minister Yoav Kisch attributed the results partly to the extraordinary circumstances facing pupils when the tests were taken in April 2025, during the Gaza war.
He said students had sat the exams “at the height of war”, when northern communities had been evacuated, parents and teachers were serving repeated rounds of reserve duty and families endured “night after night of air raid sirens”.
OECD education director Andreas Schleicher noted that the results should be considered alongside the conditions in which Israeli children were studying, saying the security situation had placed “extraordinary pressure on students, families and schools”.
However, Israel’s National Parents’ Leadership Association called the findings a “real warning alarm”, saying the war and Covid pandemic could not absolve decision-makers of responsibility.
The Israeli decline came amid a broader deterioration internationally, with the OECD reporting that reading, maths and science scores among teenagers had fallen to their lowest levels this century. Increased screen time and a decline in reading for pleasure were among the factors highlighted.
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