What to make of the the 2012 PISA rankings?
NPR is calling the test results "Sobering."
The findings from OECD's 2012 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), the international assessment that measures 15-year-old students' reading, mathematics, and science literacy, have been released. Compared to the 33 other OECD nations around the world, American teens ranked 17th in reading, 21st in science, and 26th in math.
So we're not number one and we haven't been in quite some time: On average, American test scores haven't improved in about a decade. This trend, this educational stagnation, must serve as a wake up call against educational complacency and low expectations, according to Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.
What do these scores actually tell us? I tend to be a little wary of standardized tests and the degree to which they become burdensome on both students and teachers. What's particularly telling, however, is that the PISA is designed to measure literacy. It's a standardized measure, sure, but the overall structure is aimed at assessing critical thinking skills and not simple test-taking or memorization abilities.
It tell us that average U.S. scores are lower for students coming from more marginalized groups partly because "a disproportionately greater share of U.S. students comes from disadvantaged social class groups, whose performance is relatively low in every country." Some would argue that this might not place the U.S. as far down on the educational hierarchy as PISA would suggest--after all, there are disadvantaged social classes in every country. I would argue that the hierarchy, then, is not the most important thing here. If there is an achievement gap in the U.S. (which there is) then that matters more than global competition. And if global competitiveness is the main focus, it cannot possibly be attainable when our own achievement levels are so fragmented.