As in America, the U.K. and European newspapers are having a field day reporting the results of the 2012 PISA results.   Here are few that I’ve read.

• UK students stuck in educational doldrums, OECD study finds
• China’s Success? Pushy Parents and Pushier Teachers
• Asian economies top OECD’s latest PISA survey of global education, underscoring the key role of hard work and quality teaching.
• Vietnam: The Rising Star
• Anxious UK pupils lag behind in maths

One of the sub-headlines reads: UK teenagers slip down world league in maths, science and reading.

PISA has a life of its own, and its existence of course is based on the drive of a few people at the OECD, in particular Andreas Schleicher, special advisor and chief developer of the test.  The Guardian refers to him at The OECD’s Pisa delivery man.

PBS aired an interview with Dr. Schleicher on December 3rd focusing on how American education measures up to schools around the globe.  The interview is instructive in that it is clear that Schleicher tells the interviewer that, Well, yes, I think the U.S. is an average performer.  Although the interviewer asked a few probing questions, Schleicher managed to stay to the OECD line that these tests are a valid measure of education world-wide, and that we’d better look at those nations whose students are at the top of World League Tables in maths, reading and science.

Is Asian Education the Answer?

If we look closely at the those countries (mainly in Asia) we might be surprised to find out that many educators within these systems are not happy with their education system.  Yong Zhao, who has written extensively about American and Chinese education wrote that it is a mistake to think that the day-to-day system of education has improved in these countries.  As he points out, students from these countries have always done well on standardized exams.

Dr. Zhao, in recent post on the National Education Policy Center blog, addressed this issue.  His comments are extremely important to help us sort out the meaning of these international tests, in particular, PISA.  He says:

The 2009 PISA results have already begun to shift the world’s attention away from Finland to Shanghai. I fear that the 2012 PISA will complete that shift and make Shanghai and other East Asian education systems THE model of education because the magic potion that East Asian success in international tests is very poisonous.

The recipe for the East Asian success is actually not that magical. It includes all the elements that have been identified as the symptoms of the GERM (Global Education Reform Movement) by the great Finnish education scholar Pasi Sahlberg: Competition, Standardization, Frequent Testing, and Privatization. In East Asian high PISA performing systems, these ingredients are more effectively combined and carried out to an extreme to result in entire societies devoted to ensure that their youngsters become excellent test takers.

While the East Asian systems may enjoy being at the top of international tests, they are not happy at all with the outcomes of their education. They have recognized the damages of their education for a long time and have taken actions to reform their systems. Recently, the Chinese government again issued orders to lesson student academic burden by reducing standardized tests and written homework in primary schools. The Singaporeans have been working reforming its curriculum and examination systems. The Koreans are working on implementing a “free semester” for the secondary students. Eastern Asian parents are willing and working hard to spend their life’s savings finding spots outside these “best” education systems. Thus international schools, schools that follow the less successful Western education model, have been in high demand and continue to grow in East Asia.

The Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), a 50 year-old organization monitors events in member nations and publishes policy recommendations based on their survey research.

OECD developed the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) which it gives to students from cooperating nations every three years.  The 2012 PISA was given to 510,000 students between the ages of 15 years 3 monte and 16 years 2 months.  However, each student who sat for the exam took only a small part of the PISA test.  Student scores are statistically joined to arrive at a nation’s average score in maths, reading and science.

The test is so long that no student could bear to sit for the hours that it would take.  This fact is often not mentioned in the news reports, and it one of the many issues that researchers raise when discussing PISA.

If you want to sit for a few minutes to answer a few of the PISA questions, follow this link.

The questions are paper and pencil, and each student sits for about 2 hours.  Each student completes a questionnaire (about their backgrounds, school and learning experiences) and then a mixture of open-ended and multiple-choice questions.  According to the PISA website, about 390 minutes of test items were covered, but again not by each student.

The PISA results need to be evaluated carefully, and it would be a mistake to listen to the initial comments by leaders of the testing movement such as Andreas Schleicher, or Arne Duncan.  We need time for researchers to look at the data, and write reports based on careful deliberation.