Israel Makes Financial Literacy Mandatory — Then Quietly Skips the OECD Test That Would Grade It

JERUSALEM — Israel's Ministry of Education has unveiled the curriculum for a brand-new mandatory subject: financial education. Starting with the 2026-27 school year, ninth and tenth graders will study four core areas — responsible consumer behavior, money and banking, the modern labor market, and investment basics — taught by a corps of teachers already deep into training. About 550 educators have completed their coursework so far, with another 750 beginning training in September and a further 1,300 joining an extended course in October.

Education Minister Yoav Kisch has framed the program as something close to a personal mission, calling it a chance to give "every male and female student in Israel a practical financial toolkit that will serve them for the rest of their lives." By 2027, the curriculum expands to 10th grade, layering in real-world skills like reading a pay slip and comparing investment risk across the capital market, real estate, and foreign currency.

Here's the twist: the same week Israel finalized this curriculum, its Education Ministry quietly confirmed it will skip the OECD's 2029 PISA Financial Literacy Assessment — the exact international test designed to measure whether programs like this one actually work. A ministry spokesperson called it a matter of timing, arguing the new curriculum won't have had time to show results before the test date. Officials at Israel's central bank objected to the decision, and Haaretz reported the ministry had spent months denying it was even considering an opt-out before confirming it in May.

Israel has real reason to be nervous about that comparison: its financial-literacy rankings in prior OECD assessments have not been strong, and one small academic study found Israeli students scoring particularly low on core banking and saving concepts, with financial literacy varying sharply by household income and religious background. Whether Israel's new mandatory subject actually closes that gap, or the country simply avoids finding out for another testing cycle, is now an open question with a very specific expiration date: 2029.