Did you know that Malaysia's performance in Pisa 2022 has shown a decline in all three literacy measures assessed? According to the data from OECD (link), Malaysia is ranked 55 with an overall PISA score of 404. It's true!
Will someone ever take responsibility for this year-on-year education crisis happening in Malaysia?
Pisa, which is administered by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) every three years on 15-year-olds in both OECD and non-OECD countries, offers students questions in the main language of instruction in their respective countries.
So, three domains are assessed in Pisa - reading literacy, mathematics literacy and scientific literacy. Unfortunately, Malaysia's scores have dropped in all three domains. For the reading domain, which is the biggest in Pisa, Malaysia scored 388, a drop of 27 from 415 points in 2018. In mathematics, our 15-year-olds had a score of 409 compared to 440 points while science also dropped 22 to 416 from 438 points.
But wait, it gets worse! Less than 50% of our students reached the minimum level (Level 2) for the reading domain. Yikes!
On the bright side, 13 countries improved their Pisa score in the assessment, but unfortunately, 58 dropped and only two maintained their score. The last round was delayed from 2021 to 2022 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Each round focuses on either Reading, Mathematics or Science. This international benchmark study helps measure how prepared 15-year-olds who underwent formal education are to fully integrate into modern society.
In Malaysia, 27% of students (the largest share) were in the 2nd international quintile of the socio-economic scale, meaning that they were neither among the most disadvantaged, nor among the most advantaged students who took the PISA test in 2022. Their average score in mathematics was 387 score points. In Türkiye and Viet Nam, students of similar socio-economic background tend to score significantly higher.
Across the border, Singapore takes the top spot with an impressive overall PISA score of 560. Macau comes second, trailing some way behind Singapore, with a commendable score of 535. Taiwan and Japan share the third position, both reporting an overall PISA score of 533.
Despite COVID-19 disruptions, including those from lower-SES homes, Singapore's students continue a strong performance.
Following are the top countries with highest PISA scores (followed by Malaysia’s ranking):
1. Singapore - 560
2. Macau - 535
3. Taiwan - 533
4. Japan - 533
5. South Korea - 523
6. Hong Kong - 520
7. Estonia - 516
8. Canada - 506
9. Ireland - 504
10. Switzerland - 498
.
13. Finland - 495
14. United Kingdom - 494
.
42. Brunei - 439
.
55. Malaysia - 404
Again, will someone ever take responsibility for this year-on-year education crisis happening in Malaysia?
Links: OECD, The Star, Data Pandas
Dr Siva is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
The User Content (as defined on Newswav Terms of Use) above including the views expressed and media (pictures, videos, citations etc) were submitted & posted by the author. Newswav is solely an aggregation platform that hosts the User Content. If you have any questions about the content, copyright or other issues of the work, please contact Newswav.
