PISA in Spain: rich students have lost more level than vulnerable ones

BarcelonaThe PISA report released this Tuesday by the OECD shows a significant change in trend in Spain. Beyond reaching the worst level in history, and unlike what happened with the 2022 edition, the Spanish students who have worsened the most are those with a higher socioeconomic level. Specifically, in reading comprehension, the wealthiest students have lost 33 points, double that of the most vulnerable students (-15). The same happens with mathematics: students with a better socioeconomic situation lose 24 points, while those of lower social status lose 10. In other words, regarding reading, the richest students have lost a year and a half of knowledge in Spain, while their poorer peers have regressed less than a year. The difference is even more abysmal in sciences: the wealthiest students lose triple the points than the most disadvantaged ones.

However, despite this sharper drop in the knowledge level of rich students, the poorest students continue to get worse results. For example in science – the most analyzed competency in this edition of PISA – 25% of students with the highest socioeconomic level outperform by 71 points 25% of their peers who have a lower socioeconomic level. In this sense, it must be taken into account that PISA divides students into four groups based on the socioeconomic and cultural profile of the family to which they belong.

That the richest students are the ones who have lost the most level is a phenomenon that has occurred throughout the OECD and which has surprised those responsible for the PISA report. "The biggest surprise is who has fallen furthest behind. It has not been the most disadvantaged students, but those from wealthy families. This finding points to a much broader challenge than inequality alone," notes the report when speaking of the generalized drop in reading comprehension. However, the authors of PISA also make it clear that there is nothing to celebrate: "Socioeconomic disparities have narrowed due to the decline in performance among advantaged students and not because of gains among disadvantaged students".

Although presented as a global phenomenon, the Spanish PISA report is clear: "The magnitude of this decline [among the wealthiest students] is clearly higher in Spain [than in the OECD average]". In fact, in mathematics, it is stated that "Spain presents a more marked deterioration than the OECD average in all socioeconomic groups, especially in the most favored one".

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Access to AI, a possible reason?

Although the OECD report does not draw a concrete conclusion about the reason why the wealthiest students have lost more knowledge level than the poorest ones, some differences are observed between the two groups of students that could explain this difference. In this sense, the PISA X-ray concludes two things: the most disadvantaged students have less possibility of accessing technology and using artificial intelligence; and students who do not use AI for "specific school tasks outperform their peers in most countries and economies".

Despite this possible hypothesis, the report clarifies that the impact of AI use on results has many shades of gray, as they have also observed that, if students use this technology "moderately" –at most once a week–, they do not obtain worse academic results than their peers who do not use it. On the other hand, they are indeed forceful about the risk of intensive use: "Students who use AI to help them learn frequently (almost every day or more) or occasionally tend to have lower scores than those who are not users".

Private schools have better results, but because of the environment

The PISA report also provides a snapshot –albeit only regarding scientific competence– of the differences in results between public and private/charter schools. The study details that in Spain, students in private schools achieve better results than those in public ones, but this gap between ownership types is less pronounced than that recorded across the OECD as a whole. Although the difference in points regarding Spain is not specified, it is noted that in OECD countries, students in private schools achieve 33 more points –the equivalent of a year and a half of knowledge– than their peers in public schools in science.

However, returning to Spain, the authors of the report also perform the exercise of not taking into account the points lost due to a school and a student being socioeconomically vulnerable. Upon doing so, the situation flips: public schools obtain better results than private ones. "This indicates that a significant part of the initial advantage of private schools is due to the socioeconomic and cultural origin of their student body," concludes the report, which explains that this change is also detected across Europe and the OECD as a whole.