Israel's Classrooms Among World's Most Crowded, Teachers Face High Turnover

Israel ranks second among OECD countries for elementary school class size and third for middle school, according to a new report from the Education EAG organization. The average class in Israeli elementary schools has 27.2 students, compared to a developed country average of 20. The report also highlights a significant issue with teacher retention, revealing that a majority of educators leave the profession within their first five years.

Furthermore, Israeli teachers earn approximately 9% less than their OECD counterparts in elementary and middle schools, and about 7% less in high schools. However, kindergarten teachers see a slight advantage, earning about 3% more than the OECD average. Despite these challenges, Israel dedicates a substantial portion of its government spending to education, ranking fourth among OECD nations with 14.7% of total government expenditure allocated to the sector, compared to the average of 11.6%.

These findings follow recent PISA test results, which showed sharp declines in science and math scores and a historic low in reading comprehension for Israeli students. The 2025 PISA results indicate a significant crisis in the education system, with Israel experiencing one of the steepest overall declines between 2022 and 2025. The tests, which assessed 14-year-old students in grades 9 and 10, suggest the education system struggled to cope with the impact of the war over the past three years. These results are compared to those from 2022, before the war began, a period when Yoav Kisch served as Education Minister. Reports indicate that Kisch surprisingly released the test results, which some suggested he had attempted to conceal, following the poor international test performance.