The PISA report highlights several structural issues affecting developed economies, such as declining engagement between teachers and parents and a lack of teaching staff.
The PISA report highlights several structural issues affecting developed economies, such as declining engagement between teachers and parents and a lack of teaching staff.
The recent findings from the Programme for International Student Assessment tests, gauging the educational proficiency of 15-year-olds across nations, have sparked significant apprehension over the state of education in the United Kingdom.
The 2022 results underscore a noteworthy deterioration in core skills subjects within the UK, with mathematics and reading proficiency hitting their lowest points in over a decade. This decline starkly mirrors the profound impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on learning outcomes and educational standards.
The PISA tests, a primary international benchmark managed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, revealed that the average score for UK students in mathematics was the lowest since records began in 2006. Reading levels were on par with the record low of 2009. Despite these declines, the UK climbed in the results table in both math and reading, as other developed countries experienced larger declines following the pandemic.
The data, derived from assessments conducted in 2022, emerges against a backdrop of increasing concern about learning loss during the coronavirus crisis. UK education experts are advocating for more investment to help restore standards to pre-pandemic levels. John Bangs, a senior adviser at Education International, emphasized the “double whammy” effect on schools, grappling with the disruptions caused by COVID-19 and pre-existing structural issues in the education system.
In the 2022 PISA rankings, UK students scored higher than the OECD average in both math and reading. However, when compared to their counterparts from 2018, the 2022 cohort exhibited a significant learning lag, with a two-thirds year delay in math and half a year in reading. This gap could widen further once sampling biases are accounted for.
Decline in performance
Notably, Welsh schools registered the largest fall in outcomes within the UK, declining almost twice as much as those in England. This has led to a widening of the attainment gap between Wales and England, which had been narrowing before the pandemic.
The PISA report highlights several structural issues affecting developed economies, such as declining engagement between teachers and parents and a lack of teaching staff. UK teacher shortages have notably increased between 2018 and 2022.
John Bangs pointed out that countries with shorter lockdowns tended to fare better in the PISA survey, suggesting that the UK’s prolonged school closures and hierarchical approach to school management contributed to the decline.
Bangs said, “The most successful countries (in the Pisa survey) are those that had short lockdowns, while countries that did not work closely with teachers such as the UK tended to keep schools closed for longer.”
“(The UK has) a very hierarchical approach to school management, which takes leadership out of teachers’ hands,” Bangs added.
Andreas Schleicher, the OECD’s director for education and skills, also noted that while COVID-19 played a role, the decline in educational outcomes started before the pandemic in most countries.
“Covid is part of the story, but not everything. The decline of educational outcomes started before the pandemic in most countries,” Schleicher stated.
In response, Education Secretary Gillian Keegan emphasized England’s high ranking for reading and attributed the success to teachers, students, and the government’s efforts to raise school standards over the past 13 years.
“These results are testament to our incredible teachers, the hard work of students and to the government’s unrelenting drive to raise school standards over the past 13 years,” Keegan said.
However, education experts like Natalie Perera, CEO of the Education Policy Institute, are calling for more targeted catch-up funding, especially for the most disadvantaged pupils in the most disadvantaged areas.
“The government needs to target resources towards the most disadvantaged pupils in the most disadvantaged areas. There’s been a big gap between the funding needed and the funding made available in England,” she said.
Underestimating standards
Finally, the PISA report flagged potential underestimation in the decline of educational standards in the UK due to data collection issues. John Jerrim, a professor at University College London, highlighted that the pandemic led to increased pupil absences, further complicating data collection and possibly masking the full extent of the educational decline.
The 2022 PISA results underscore the significant challenges facing the UK’s education system in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The declining performance in core skills subjects like mathematics and reading signals a need for targeted interventions and systemic reforms to address both the pandemic’s impact and pre-existing structural issues.
As education stakeholders grapple with these challenges, the focus remains on bridging the widening attainment gaps and restoring educational standards to pre-pandemic levels.
