Education in
Montenegro
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 Montenegro
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Reading
Maths
Science
Average scores
Regional and international educational performance
Montenegro performs better than other Western
Balkans systems in reading, maths and science.
These scores are close to those of some
countries in Europe, such as Bulgaria, Greece
and Romania.
Education performance in Montenegro 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
67% of upper secondary students attend a vocational programme.
Roughly 55% of these students cannot read
proficiently.
Selection into upper secondary programmes is
not equitable:
Boys are 1.4x more likely than girls
to attend vocational training
programmes
Boys
Girls
Disadvantaged students are 2.2x more
likely than advantaged students to
attend vocational training programmes
Advantaged
Disadvantaged
Accounting for gender and socio-economic
status in Montenegro results in a decline in the
performance gap between 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
Montenegro is low regionally
and internationally
Montenegro performs better than expected given its level of funding.
However, its expenditure on education is far
less than the OECD average. More spending
could contribute to even higher results.
Provision of educational
resources in Montenegro is
low and inequitable
Principals in Montenegro reported greater concerns
about resource shortages in schools with more
disadvantaged students.
This trend is also seen across
Western Balkans economies and
OECD countries.
Montenegro
Western Balkans
Montenegro
Teaching practices in
Montenegro differ from
international
benchmarks
Compared to the average across OECD
countries:
Montenegro tends to use more teacher-
directed instruction
And less adaptive methods that focus on
meeting students’ individual needs.
The practices commonly
used by teachers in
Montenegro 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
Montenegro
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 Montenegro
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 Montenegro
-0.22 Montenegro
-0.14
Schools General
Education
Programmes Montenegro
0.11 Montenegro
0.01 (Not statistically significant)
This is likely to further exacerbate existing performance disparities.
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