About

Tarek is Associate Professor in Education and Public Policy at the School of Education, University of Birmingham. Previously, he was a policy analyst at the OECD directorate of Education and Skills (PISA team) and a Senior Research Associate at University College London, Institute of Education.

His research spanned several areas including: equity in education, assessment, education and social policy, and quantitative and survey methods. Tarek worked extensively on international surveys such as PISA and TIMSS, the different British Cohort Studies, and British administrative data. He also taught on several courses, supervised postgraduate and PhD students and provided consultancy services to national and international organizations.

At the OECD, Tarek carried out work on teacher job satisfaction and on the effectiveness of science teaching strategies using PISA 2015 data. He also led the development of the PISA 2021 ICT framework and survey instruments. He was the main analyst and sole author of the PISA 2018 Volume VI: Are Students Ready to Thrive in an Interconnected World? This OECD report was the first of its kind as it analysed data focusing on students’ global and intercultural competencies.

Tarek holds a PhD in the Economics of Education, an MA in Political Economy and a BA in Economics. He is a fellow of the Higher Education Academy and an Honorary Senior Lecturer at the UCL – Department of Social Science.

Tarek is fluent in English, French and Arabic.