2023-12-15 23:30:18
Barcelona¿Can Catalonia’s poor results in the PISA tests be explained by the country’s investment in education? “It’s not the only reason, but it’s one of them,” answers Esade public policy analyst Lucas Gortazar, who specializes in educational policies. The expert places three reasons behind the Catalan failure: the pandemic (common to the rest of the countries), a high volume of newly arrived and vulnerable students in Catalonia in relation to other communities and countries, and a low budget investment in this matter. When it comes to taking an x-ray of the countries and communities participating in the PISA tests, Catalonia comes out on the losing end, no matter how you look at it. Castilla y León, the Spanish community with the best results, invests almost twice as much of its gross domestic product (GDP) in education as Catalonia. 4.49% compared to 2.52%. Compared to OECD countries, the relationship between education budgets and Catalan GDP is also far from Estonia, Germany, France or Japan. With a single exception: Singapore, which is the country that leads the results ranking, but only invests 2.39% of its GDP in education.
Investment in education according to position in the ranking of the PISA tests
As a percentage of GDP
However, the differences between the Asian country and the Catalan reality are many. In fact, one of the variables where Catalonia has a very different profile from the rest of the countries is the number of newly arrived students it serves. The PISA report includes in this group both students born in Catalonia, but of foreign mothers, and students born outside Catalonia: 24% are. In contrast, these students are only 1% of the total in Japan, which obtained the third best results in this year’s PISA tests. The Catalan percentage is similar to that of Germany (26%), which this year also obtained the worst results in its history.
But the fact is that the Catalan social, economic and cultural index (-0.02% according to the scales used by PISA) is also very far from that of Castilian and Leon (+0.08%), if the comparison is made within Spain. And it is below countries such as Estonia (+0.08%), which has obtained the fourth best results in the PISA ranking. The authors of the report explain that the influence of this index on the results is not “the same” in all countries. But it is a good reference, they say, about the “fairness” of each educational system. “The greater the percentage of variability, the lower the level of equity in the education system”, conclude the editors of the report, who add that Catalonia has a less equitable model than the Spanish average.
“Investment is the great pending subject,” emphasizes Gortázar. The money that Catalonia allocates to each student (5,229.5 euros for each student this year 2023-2024 if the comparison is made with this year’s Education budgets) is far from the 6,082 euros that, on average, the countries invest of the European continent. There is a difference of more than 1,300 euros between the figure allocated by Catalonia for each student and that allocated by Castile and Leon this year. The Castilian-Leonese government invests 6,555.5 euros in each child or adolescent. Despite everything, Catalonia is not the community that provides the least money to its students. For example, in Andalusia the average investment per student this year is 4,722.6 euros. The Andalusian community is one of those with the worst results in the PISA tests: it is fourth from the bottom of the Spanish ranking. In fact, it falls to nineteenth place, while Catalonia occupies seventeenth.
Focus resources
Gortázar calculates that Catalonia should increase the investment per student by at least 1,000 euros. However, he also warns that it is not just about pouring money into education, but about putting it where it belongs. And, in this sense, the analyst considers that it is in the attention to vulnerable students (often this variable also coincides with the fact of being a newcomer) where the resources must be put. “We need to increase investment, especially in the students who have the most needs, strengthen the programs with this type of students, lower the ratios in the classrooms, do more individualized tutoring, promote basic skills and language adaptations”, he underlines. “Where the system grows the most is in pockets of poverty, equal opportunities are at stake,” he adds.
Beyond this, Gortázar points to another factor: the importance given to education, among families and the students themselves, as a tool for progress or opportunities. Despite everything, remember that the indices offered by the PISA report are only “a metric” and that it is necessary to take into account the rest of the assessments that are carried out on an international, Spanish and Catalan scale in order to be able to make a complete X-ray of the strengths and weaknesses in our education system.
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