An international ranking of education in nations worldwide shows that seven out of every 10 students in Argentina do not reach basic levels in maths, while five out of every 10 adolescents do not meet minimal levels in language and science.
The finding comes from a review of data published in the 2022 PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) scholastic testing report, an international study by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) that evaluates performance by 15-year-old school pupils' in mathematics, science, and reading.
A total of 81 countries participated in last year’s edition of the PISA tests with Argentina ranking 66th.
Now a report by the Observatorio de Argentinos por la Educación that dives deeper into the data has highlighted the problems facing young students in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The report shows that Argentina remains stuck on the average levels seen in 2018.
"The report compares last year’s results with the performances in previous editions. The 2022 data show Argentina to be lagging behind other Latin American countries. The 378 points in maths fall behind Chile (412 points), Uruguay (409), Costa Rica (385), Mexico (395), Peru (391), Colombia (383) and Brazil (379) while ahead of Guatemala (344), El Salvador (343), Panama (357), Paraguay (338) and the Dominican Republic (339)," concludes the study.
In this subject, 72.9 percent of students are performing below Level 2 with barely 0.3 percent in the highest levels (5 and 6). By way of comparison, in OECD countries 8.7 percent of pupils reach those levels.
The language results are also discouraging. Argentina passed from 402 points in 2018 to 401 in 2022, below Chile (448), Uruguay (430), Costa Rica (415), Mexico (415), Brazil (410), Colombia (409) and Peru (408) while only topping Panama (392), Guatemala (374), Paraguay (373), El Salvador (365) and the Dominican Republic (351).
"In this subject we rank 58th among the 81 participants with 54.4 percent of students ranking below Level 2 while barely one percent of Argentine pupils reaches the highest levels (5 and 6) where OECD countries average 7.2 percent," reads the report.
Lastly, in science this country scored 406 points, again falling behind Chile (444), Uruguay (435), Mexico (410), Costa Rica (411), Colombia (411) and Peru (408) while topping Brazil (403), Panama (388), Paraguay (368), the Dominican Republic (360), El Salvador (373) and Guatemala (373).
Argentina “ranks 60th among 81 participants in this subject with 53.9 percent of students performing below Level 2 and only 0.5 percent of pupils reaching the highest levels (5 and 6) whereas the OECD average is 7.5 percent," the report highlights.
Singapore, Macao (China), China Taipei, Hong Kong (China) and Japan headed the PISA 2022 rankings in maths "where steep falls were noted in all the Nordic countries – Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland and Norway."
The worst results in this subject were obtained by Guatemala, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Paraguay and Cambodia.
– TIMES/NA
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