Soulclap to the Black Star Project for sharing this information with us. It is a scary situation when the rest of the world is reading better than us ... especially those of us of African descent here in America.
The bottom line is that we need to get busy reading again!
The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) is an international assessment that measures the performance of 15-year-olds in reading literacy, mathematics literacy, and science literacy. Coordinated by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), an intergovernmental organization of 34 member countries, PISA was first implemented in 2000 and is conducted every 3 years. PISA 2009 was the fourth cycle of the assessment.
Each PISA data collection effort assesses one of the three subject areas in depth (considered the major subject area), although all three are assessed in each cycle (the other two subjects are considered minor subject areas for that assessment year). Assessing all three areas allows participating countries to have an ongoing source of achievement data in every subject area while rotating one area as the main focus over the years. In the fourth cycle of PISA, reading was the subject area assessed in depth, as it was in 2000.
Sixty countries and 5 other education systems (located in non-national places like Shanghai-China) participated as partners in PISA 2009. This report focuses on the performance of U.S. students in the major subject area of reading literacy as assessed in PISA 2009.
Let's get to it ... I invite 'villagers' to take a look at the international ranks shown below for 'combined reading literacy'.
International Ranking - Country/Other Education System - Comparative Score
1. Shanghai - China 556
2. Korea, Republic of 539
3. Finland 536
4. Hong Kong - China 533
5. Singapore 526
6. Canada 524
7. New Zealand 521
8. Japan 520
9. Australia 515
10. Netherlands 508
11. Belgium 506
12. Norway 503
13. Estonia 501
14. Switzerland 501
15. Poland 500
16. Iceland 500
17. United States 500
18. Liechtenstein 499
19. Sweden 497
20. Germany 497
21. Ireland 496
22. France 496
23. Denmark 495
24. Taiwan - China 495
25. United Kingdom 494
26. Hungary 494
27. Portugal 489
28. Macao-China 487
29. Italy 486
30. Latvia 484
31. Slovenia 483
32. Greece 483
33. Spain 481
34. Czech Republic 478
35. Slovak Republic 477
36. Croatia 476
37. Israel 474
38. Luxembourg 472
39. Austria 470
40. Lithuania 468
41. Turkey 464
42. Dubai-UAE 459
43. Russian Federation 459
44. Chile 449
45. Serbia, Republic of 442
46. Bulgaria 429
47. Uruguay 426
48. Mexico 425
49. Romania 424
50. Thailand 421
51. Trinidad and Tobago 416
52. Colombia 413
53. Brazil 412
54. Montenegro, Republic of 408
55. Jordan 405
56. Tunisia 404
57. Indonesia 402
58. Argentina 398
59. Kazakhstan 390
60. Albania 385
61. Qatar 372
62. Panama 371
63. Peru 370
64. Azerbaijan 362
65. Kyrgyz Republic 314
Where various U.S. racial populations would rank among the world's best readers:
- U.S. average 500 - Rank 17 out of 65 reporting countries
- Asian, non-Hispanic 541 - Rank 2 out of 65 reporting countries
- White, non-Hispanic 525 - Rank 6 out of 65 reporting countries
- Hispanic 466 - Rank 41 out of 65 reporting countries
- Black, non-Hispanic 441 - Rank 46 out of 65 reporting countries
Please click here to see full report.
