While most 15-year-old students spend part of their after-school time doing homework, the amount of time they spend on it shrank between 2003 and 2012. Socio-economically advantaged students and students who attend socio-economically advantaged schools tend to spend more time doing homework....

Fewer 15-year-olds in East Asian countries reported that they use memorisation than did 15‑year‑olds in some of the English-speaking countries to whom they are often compared. In no PISA-participating education system did boys report more intensive use of memorisation than girls when...

Some 65% of socio-economically advantaged students reported that they know well or have often heard of the concept of quadratic function, on average across OECD countries; but only 43% of disadvantaged students so reported. On average across OECD countries, the 20% of students who are most...

In most school systems, over 50% of 15-year-olds students attend schools that compete with another school to attract students from the same residential area. Across countries and economies, performance is unrelated to whether or not schools have to compete for students. When choosing a school...

Regardless of the type of school attended (public or private, advantaged or disadvantaged), 15-year-old students spent more time in mathematics lessons in 2012 than in 2003. The average amount of time spent in mathematics classes varies by more than a factor of two across countries and...

General government deficit is defined as the balance of income and expenditure of government, including capital income and capital expenditures. "Net lending" means that government has a surplus, and is providing financial resources to other sectors, while "net borrowing" means that government...

Governments collect revenues mainly for two purposes: to finance the goods and services they provide to citizens and businesses, and to fulfil their redistributive role. Comparing levels of government revenues across countries provides an indication of the importance of the government sector in...