Education Crisis Deepens as PISA Scores Fall to Record Lows in mathematics reading and science

 Israel's education system is facing a deepening crisis after the country's 15-year-old students recorded their lowest-ever PISA scores in mathematics, reading and science, according to results released by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

The 2025 assessment shows that Israeli students performed substantially below the OECD average in all three core subjects. More significantly, Israel's decline between 2022 and 2025 was considerably steeper than the deterioration recorded across OECD countries.

The results place Israel in the bottom fifth of OECD countries, raising serious questions about the quality of education, teacher shortages, learning gaps and the long-term implications for Israel's human capital and economy.

Israel's Scores Fall to Their Lowest Levels Ever

Israeli students scored an average of:

• 433 points in mathematics, compared with an OECD average of 463;
• 436 points in reading, compared with an OECD average of 461;
• 442 points in science, compared with an OECD average of 482.

The deterioration since the previous PISA assessment in 2022 was particularly severe.

Mathematics fell by 25 points, compared with a nine-point decline across the OECD.

Reading dropped by 38 points, compared with a 14-point decline across the OECD.

Science declined by 23 points, while the OECD average fell by only three points.

The OECD says Israel's 2025 results in all three subjects are significantly below its results in 2018, 2015 and 2012.

Israel's Decline Is Much Sharper Than the OECD Average

The deterioration cannot simply be explained by a worldwide decline in educational performance.

OECD countries as a group also recorded weaker results. The OECD reported that average mathematics and reading performance reached their lowest levels ever recorded in the PISA assessment.

But the Israeli decline was substantially larger.

While mathematics performance fell by nine points across the OECD between 2022 and 2025, Israel fell by 25 points.

In reading, the OECD decline was 14 points, compared with 38 points in Israel.

And while science performance remained broadly stable across the OECD, Israel's score fell by 23 points.

This distinction is crucial: Israel is not merely following a global deterioration in student performance. It is declining at a considerably faster rate.

Almost Half of Israeli Students Fail to Reach Basic Mathematics Proficiency

The proportion of students performing below the basic PISA proficiency threshold has also reached alarming levels.

Only 54% of Israeli students reached Level 2 or higher in mathematics, compared with 65% across the OECD.

In reading, 59% reached at least Level 2, compared with 69% across the OECD.

In science, the figure was 60%, compared with 74% across OECD countries.

This means that approximately 46% of Israeli 15-year-olds were classified as low performers in mathematics, while 41% were low performers in reading and 40% in science.

According to Israel's National Authority for Measurement and Evaluation in Education, the proportion of low-performing students has reached its highest level since 2006.

Israel's International Ranking Has Deteriorated

Israel ranked in the bottom fifth of OECD countries in the 2025 assessment.

Among the 38 OECD countries participating in the relevant comparisons, Israel ranked:

31st in reading, 33rd in mathematics and 33rd in science.

Reading was particularly problematic, with Israel dropping five places compared with its 2022 position. Its mathematics ranking fell by one place, while science declined by two places.

The rankings are less important than the underlying scores, but they illustrate the scale of Israel's deterioration relative to other developed education systems.

Reading Has Become a Particularly Serious Weakness

Reading produced the most dramatic decline.

Israel's score fell by 38 points between 2022 and 2025, one of the largest decreases recorded among participating countries and economies.

The proportion of Israeli students reaching the highest proficiency levels in reading fell from 11% to just 5%.

At the same time, the percentage of students classified as low performers increased substantially.

The decline has potentially serious implications because reading comprehension is a foundation for virtually every other academic discipline.

Students who struggle to understand complex written material face difficulties not only in language studies but also in mathematics, science, history and higher education.

The Problem Begins Before Age 15

PISA is not an isolated warning.

Other international assessments have already documented significant weaknesses in the Israeli education system at younger ages.

The broader pattern emerging from international assessments suggests that educational difficulties accumulate over time — beginning in elementary school, becoming more visible in middle school and culminating in the PISA results among 15-year-olds.

This makes the latest PISA results particularly significant.

They suggest that the problem is not confined to a particular age group or a single examination.

Teacher Shortages Raise Serious Concerns

The PISA data also point toward a structural problem inside Israeli schools.

In 2025, 50% of Israeli students attended schools whose principals reported that instruction was hindered, at least to some extent, by a shortage of teaching staff, compared with 39% across the OECD.

Even more strikingly, 47% of Israeli students were in schools where principals reported that teaching was affected by teachers who were considered unsuitable or insufficiently qualified, compared with 25% across OECD countries.

According to RAMA, Israel ranked third among OECD countries in the reported scale of this problem.

The finding raises one of the central questions confronting Israeli policymakers:

Can Israel reverse the decline without substantially improving teacher recruitment, training and retention?

A Crisis That Cannot Be Explained Only by the War

The 2025 PISA examination was conducted in Israel in March and April 2025, while the country was still engaged in war on several fronts.

The war undoubtedly disrupted education, forced many students and teachers out of routine learning environments and placed enormous psychological and logistical pressures on schools.

However, the latest results cannot simply be attributed to the war.

Israel had already recorded weak performance in previous PISA cycles, and the latest OECD data show a longer-term decline.

The 2025 results therefore appear to represent an acceleration of an existing trend, rather than the beginning of the crisis.

The Crisis Is Not Limited to One Population Group

Israel's educational disparities remain enormous.

RAMA reports that approximately two-thirds or more of Arabic-speaking students were classified as low performers across all three PISA subjects.

But the latest figures also expose a serious deterioration in the mainstream Hebrew-speaking state education system.

Among Hebrew-speaking students in state schools, the decline between 2022 and 2025 reached:

• 52 points in reading
• 29 points in mathematics
• 28 points in science

That finding is particularly significant because it demonstrates that Israel's educational deterioration cannot be explained solely by socioeconomic or sectoral disparities.

The Growing Gap Between Strong and Weak Students

The national averages also conceal exceptionally large differences between Israeli students.

The OECD reports a very wide performance gap between the highest- and lowest-performing students in Israel.

In science, the difference between students at the 90th and 10th percentiles was 290 points, compared with 258 points across the OECD.

The result is a highly unequal education system in which some students perform at internationally competitive levels while a large proportion struggle to reach basic proficiency.

This inequality presents an additional challenge for policymakers seeking to improve national averages without leaving disadvantaged students behind.

AI Is Growing — But It Is Not a Substitute for Learning

The PISA 2025 data also highlight a new challenge facing schools: artificial intelligence.

Almost half of Israeli students — 49% — reported using AI chatbots to help them with schoolwork at least once a week, slightly above the OECD average of 46%.

The OECD argues that technology and AI can strengthen learning when used purposefully, but warns that they cannot substitute for attention, effort and genuine understanding.

For Israel, this creates a particularly important policy challenge.

A country whose economy depends heavily on technology cannot simply reject AI in education.

But it must ensure that students learn to use AI as a tool for thinking rather than as a replacement for thinking.

The Political Battle Over the Data

The publication of the PISA results comes amid a bitter dispute between Israel's Education Ministry and RAMA over the interpretation and presentation of educational data.

Education Minister Yoav Kisch has previously criticized RAMA and questioned aspects of its methodology and presentation of the findings.

RAMA has rejected those criticisms and argued that attempts to challenge or delay the publication of the results risk diverting attention from the underlying problems in the education system.

The OECD findings provide an important independent benchmark.

The OECD explicitly states that all Israeli PISA 2025 data met the organization's quality standards and were considered fit for reporting.

That does not eliminate legitimate professional debate over methodology.

But it makes it difficult to dismiss the results as simply the product of defective measurement.

The Economic Consequences Could Be Significant

The implications extend well beyond schools.

Israel's economic model relies heavily on human capital, technological innovation, scientific research and high-skilled industries.

Weak performance in mathematics, science, reading and problem-solving could eventually translate into a smaller pool of students capable of pursuing advanced academic and technological careers.

The consequences will not necessarily be visible immediately.

The students who took PISA in 2025 will enter the workforce over the coming decade.

But if the decline continues, Israel could face a gradual deterioration in productivity, innovation and competitiveness.

A National Strategic Warning

The most important message from PISA 2025 is therefore not simply that Israeli students scored poorly.

It is that the country is experiencing a persistent decline in core educational competencies at a time when the global economy is becoming increasingly dependent on precisely those skills.

Israel's students are performing below the OECD average in mathematics, reading and science.

The decline since 2022 has been dramatically larger than the OECD average.

Teacher shortages are widespread.

Educational gaps remain exceptionally large.

And the proportion of students failing to reach basic proficiency has reached alarming levels.

The Challenge for Israel's Education System

The political debate over PISA should therefore move beyond the question of whether the numbers are embarrassing.

The central issue is what Israel intends to do about them.

Reversing the trend will require more than a new slogan, another reform or another standardized test.

It will require investment in teachers, stronger teacher training, better support for struggling students, improved basic literacy and numeracy, targeted programs for disadvantaged communities and a serious examination of what is actually being taught in Israeli classrooms.

It will also require policymakers to distinguish between legitimate criticism of assessment methodology and attempts to avoid uncomfortable conclusions.

PISA 2025 is not evidence that Israel's education system has "failed" in the literal pass-or-fail sense. It is something more consequential: a statistically robust international warning that Israeli students are falling substantially behind their peers in the developed world — and that the country's decline is significantly steeper than the OECD's overall deterioration.

The question now is not whether Israel has an education crisis.

The question is whether the country will treat it as a national strategic emergency.