The following is from the Fordham Foundation, and I have to start with a disclaimer that I don’t agree with a lot of their theories and politics, so please don’t blame me for that. However facts are facts and the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Education Week, and NPR references are all highly reputable sources.
*****************************************************
This PISA is falling
By now, you’ve read the bad news from the quadrennial Program for International Student Assessment (PISA): the math skills of American 15-year-olds are sub-standard and falling, compared to their international peers. In fact, the U.S. is outperformed by almost every developed nation, beating only poorer countries such as Mexico and Portugal. This is depressing enough, but if you look closely at the results, things get worse. The achievement gap between whites and minorities persists, and a full one-quarter of American students performed at the lowest possible level of competence or below—meaning they are unable to perform the simplest calculations. (Scores for reading and science were better, but still below average, while scores for “problem-solving” were worse than those for math.) No doubt, this is a disaster for industry, which is panicked by the thought of having to deal with future employees who are mathematical dolts. (Attention Bangalore: here come the jobs!) On NPR’s Marketplace, one businessman said he thought of this problem “in apocalyptic terms,” while Susan Traiman of the Business Roundtable called for a “Sputnik-like” urgency to tackle the problem of declining math skills. Keep an eye out for the TIMSS report next week and Fordham’s upcoming State of State Math Standards in January, both of which look likely to add additional bad news to this report on K-12 math expectations and achievement.
“Economic time bomb: U.S. students among the worst at math,” by June Kronholz, Wall Street Journal, December 7, 2004 (subscription required)
“In a global test of math skills, students behind the curve,” by Michael Dobbs, Washington Post, December 7, 2004
“U.S. students fare poorly in international math comparison,” by Sean Cavanagh and Erik W. Robelen, Education Week, December 7, 2004
“Johnny can’t do the numbers,” Marketplace on NPR, December 7, 2004 (audio link)
Some say that the PISA is bull****, because it doesn’t include factors like teaching methods, pedagogy, laws in the country etc. I don’t know enough about PISA to have an opinion about it, just wanted to add that.
I DO have an opinion about one thing though; The reading-results (here in Denmark) are pretty much the same as the last time, but the math is way lower (I think it was 5 or 6 down, just tried to find it online but I cant understand the graphs).
Okay then. This time, PISA focuses on the math-part, they have different focus-areas every time.
And what exactly are the politicians, teachers and professors here in Denmark screaming about? The reading-results. No one is focusing on the math, like PISA wants them to do. No one. In stead, the teachers, pro’s and politicians are all over the media screaming at each other and at the students for the reading-results. Ok, I get it, the reading-results ARE low and should be better, no doubt about it, but… what about the math? No one talks about that. At all. I wish we in the Danish dyscalculia association had the resources to remind them of the math results.