The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has published the results of the international PISA 2025 study, which assessed the knowledge and skills of schoolchildren in countries around the world.
In the study, 15-year-old Slovak students performed above the OECD average in mathematics, but continued to lag behind in reading and science. They scored an average of 469 points in mathematics, compared with the OECD average of 463 points. In science, the result was 475 points, compared with an OECD average of 482, while in reading literacy Slovakia scored just 448 points against an average of 461.
Reading remains the biggest problem for the Slovak education system. Around 34% of students fail to reach the basic level of reading literacy. At the same time, Slovakia’s reading results have remained below the OECD average for many years.
The most positive trend can be seen in science. Compared with the previous study, the performance of Slovak students increased by 13 points, while the OECD average declined. The share of students performing below the basic level in this area fell from 31% in 2015 to 27% in 2025.
Education Minister Tomáš Drucker described the results as grounds for cautious optimism, while also noting that reading literacy and differences between children from families with different socioeconomic backgrounds remain serious problems. Following the 2023 study, he had described the situation with literacy among Slovak schoolchildren as a “tragedy.”
Once again, Slovakia performed worse than all other members of the Visegrád Group in reading and science. In mathematics, however, its result was higher than Hungary’s and above the OECD average.
Students from a total of 91 countries participated in the study. The top five positions in the ranking were taken by the B-S-J-Z region (which includes the Chinese provinces of Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu and Zhejiang), Singapore, Macao, Taiwan and Japan. The highest-performing European countries were Estonia, the United Kingdom and Finland.
