Elementary and junior high school teachers in Japan still work the longest hours among their peers worldwide, according to an OECD report released Tuesday.

While the 2024 results by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development were lower by around four hours per week than the previous survey in 2018, it was still significantly higher than the rest of the world.

Elementary school teachers in Japan worked an average of 52.1 hours per week while junior high school teachers worked an average of 55.1 hours. Meanwhile, the survey showed that elementary school teachers around the world worked an average of 40.4 hours while teachers in middle schools worldwide worked around 41 hours.

However, the hours dedicated to teaching were lower in Japan than in other countries, meaning the long work hours were spent on class preparation, administrative duties and extracurricular activities.

The 2024 OECD Teaching and Learning International Survey is the fourth such report since it was first conducted in 2008. The latest study collected responses from 200 elementary schools and 200 middle schools per country or region.

When asked what resources principals felt were lacking in Japan＊s elementary schools, 40.7% replied ※teachers§ 〞 more than double the 19.2% recorded in the previous survey. On average, 28.7% of schools reported a shortage of teachers globally.

For junior high schools in Japan, 35.6% of principals cited a shortage of teachers, up from 27.5% in the previous survey, and compared to the world average of 23.1%.

On information and communication technology, only around 12% of both elementary and junior high school principals said education in the field was lacking 〞 far below the global average.

However, only 16% of elementary and 17.4% of junior high school teachers in Japan said they used artificial intelligence during classes within the past year, much lower than the global average of over 36% for both. This put Japan in second-to-last place among the participating countries.

In comparison, the United Arab Emirates and Singapore saw the highest percentage of teachers using AI, at 75%.

The survey showed that teachers in Japan remained cautious about the potential risks of using AI in the classroom, citing concerns over bias reinforcement and data privacy.