PISA in Low and Middle Income Countries

This paper explores the participation of low- and middle-income countries in OECD’s Programme forInternational Student Assessment (PISA). It provides a detailed description of partner countries’participation across PISA rounds and the challenges faced by low- and middle-income partner countries ineffectively implementing and deriving policy value from PISA. Specific challenges are illustrated withexamples from Tunisia and Kyrgyzstan.Many partner countries lag considerably behind OECD countries on various dimensions of social andeconomic development. Three OECD countries – Chile, Mexico, Turkey – also differ from higher-incomeOECD countries in regards to educational achievement and other indicators of social and economicdevelopment. After grouping countries based on income (GNI per capita), this paper shows that thecognitive performance of students in countries participating in PISA varies considerably not only betweendifferent country income groups but also within them. Analysis of PISA performance in relation to nationalwealth provides strong arguments for grouping countries according to their social and economicdevelopment when reflecting on challenges of participation and effective use of PISA. Lack of funding andgovernments’ fear of bad performance have been stated as potential deterrents to participation. Lack ofinstitutional capacity and less relevant results due to a non-representative sample of 15 year-olds andclustering of students at low proficiency levels are discussed as main challenges for the effective use ofPISA. The paper concludes with some considerations on how to improve the effective use of PISA resultsin these countries that may be particularly relevant in the context of the OECD’s recently launchedinitiative called PISA for Development.      