Education in Bosnia
and Herzegovina
Education is crucial for the socio-economic development
of the Western Balkans.
The results below are from the OECD’s Programme for
International Student Assessment (PISA) 2018 survey and
are representative of 15-year-old students in grade 7 and
above.
View results from Bosnia and Herzegovina
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Reading
Maths
Science
Average scores
Regional and international educational performance
Bosnia and Herzegovina performs around the regional average in reading, maths, and science.
Education performance in Bosnia and Herzegovina is inequitable
Socio-economically advantaged students and
girls perform better than boys and
disadvantaged students.
Policies are needed to help all students
succeed.
An important driver, and
reflection, of inequity is
the tracking of students
into general education and
vocational programmes
79% of upper secondary students attend a
vocational programme.
Roughly 61% of these students cannot read
proficiently.
Selection into upper secondary programmes is
not equitable:
Boys are 2x more likely than girls
to attend vocational training
programmes
Boys
Girls
Disadvantaged students are 4x more
likely than advantaged students to
attend vocational training programmes
Advantaged
Disadvantaged
Accounting for gender and socio-economic
status in Bosnia and Herzegovina results in a
decline in the performance gap between
general educational and vocational
programmes.
This suggests that student background, in
addition to ability, can largely shape whether
they attend general education or vocational
programmes.
Educational spending in
Bosnia and Herzegovina is
low internationally
More spending could contribute to higher results.
Provision of educational
resources in Bosnia and
Herzegovina is low and
inequitable
Principals in Bosnia and Herzegovina reported
greater concerns about resource shortages in
vocational schools.
This trend is also seen across Western
Balkans economies and OECD countries.
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Western Balkans
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Teaching practices in
Bosnia and Herzegovina
differ from international
benchmarks
Compared to the average across OECD
countries:
Bosnia and Herzegovina tends to use more
teacher-directed instruction.
And less adaptive methods that focus on
meeting students’ individual needs.
Herzegovina average
The practices commonly
used by teachers in
Bosnia and Herzegovina
are associated with
lower reading scores
More teacher-directed instruction is associated
with lower reading performance and more
adaptive instruction is associated with higher
reading performance in
Bosnia and Herzegovina
and throughout Western Balkans 5* and
OECD countries.
point score
*No data for North Macedonia
Teacher-directed instruction
Adaptive instruction
Positive teaching methods are not practiced equitably in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Traditional practices such as teacher-directed instruction are more frequently used in schools with more disadvantaged students and vocational programmes.
Adaptive instructional approaches associated with higher outcomes more frequently occur in schools with more advantaged students and general education programmes.
Schools Vocational
Programmes Bosnia and
Herzegovina
-0.21 Bosnia and
Herzegovina
-0.19
Schools General
Education
Programmes Bosnia and
Herzegovina
0.11 Bosnia and
Herzegovina
0.08
This is likely to further exacerbate existing performance disparities.
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