Transcriber: Uğur Baştuğ Reviewer: hila scherba
You probably think the most harmful thing
is junk food or screen time.
Actually, one of the most harmful things that happens to children
happens in school,
and it is due to the testing regime
imposed by the international testing culture.
Hang on with me for less than 10 minutes and
I will try to convince you
that you can make your children life happier and much more accomplished.
My story begins in 2008.
I was then Israeli minister of education, and in that capacity
I was invited to a Ministers of Education Conference in Strasbourg.
The topic of the discussion was
the impact of the improvements in PISA on economic growth.
PISA is an international test taken by 15 years old.
It measures the level of knowledge in literacy, science and math.
600,000 children from 79 countries around the world take the test.
Over 3 million children took it since the year 2000,
when it was first launched.
PISA ranks all the participating countries according to the results,
and obviously everyone wants to be first.
This is how education becomes a competition.
Once the meeting started on stage came Dr. Andreas Schleicher,
PISA head of Education and Skill Development.
Dr. Schleicher is often called the Global Minister of Education.
Dr. Schleifer made a remarkable presentation
about the correlation between PISA results and economic growth.
Every gain of 25 points out of 600 in the PISA test
contributes 1% to the growth of GDP per capita.
That certainly is an incredible promise that convinced policymakers to see PISA
not only as an educational tool, but as an economic one.
When I saw the graph Schleicher presented, I was astonished.
I have never seen a graph that claims to represent two variables
test results and growth,
which is applicable to all countries around the world,
from Mozambique to the United States for the next hundred years.
I wouldn’t dare to predict five years ahead, would you?
I waited patiently until other ministers of education
stood in line to get Schleicher’s recipe,
and then hesitantly I approached him
and made some critical remarks.
Schleicher looked at me dismissively and said:
“Well, you should learn more about it.”
I know ministers are supposed to be somewhat dumb and uneducated,
but I have my degrees in economics and politics,
so I decided to take him on his word.
PISA became an obsession.
Israel was my starting point.
According to PISA, it ranks at the bottom of the achievement list.
And yet, despite many structural problems,
its economy is resilient and strong
and is growing faster than the OECD average.
If PISA formula doesn’t work for Israel,
maybe it works for other places around the globe.
So I made something very simple. I draw a chart.
On the one hand, the states that were the top of the 2000 PISA list,
and on the other,
their every GDP per capita growth 15 years later.
When the 15 year old who took the test the year 2000
were already a considerable part of the workforce,
it turns out Israel is not the exception but the rule.
For example, Japan ranks fourth on PISA
and yet it suffered a long economic stagnation.
in terms of growth,
it is ranked 147 out of 193 countries.
Finland OECD’s Favorite country.
Top of the class enjoys a medium rate of growth.
It's rank 109 out of 193 countries.
Reasons for slow economic growth varies from the aging of the population,
low birth rate, global crises, changes of currency rates.
None relates to performance in PISA.
I then asked myself whether PISA could forecast
the economies that are going to grow the fastest.
According to Focus Economics,
the fastest growing economies in the next five years will be:
India, Bangladesh, Rwanda, Vietnam and Cambodia.
None participated in PISA 2000.
India participated in PISA 2009 and
came 72 out of 73 countries,
one before the last.
In fact, the map of the fastest growing economies
correlates better with the map of high levels of illiteracy
than with that of high PISA scores.
Look at the data and think for yourself.
This does not mean education and economic growth are not related.
Improvement in education support growth.
But there are significant differences
between developing and developed countries.
Developed economies reach an educational plateau.
Hence, education influences less economic growth.
Developing economies are more dependent on improvement in education.
Yet PISA ignores these finding
and makes a set of promises that are misleading.
But makes PISA extremely popular among policymakers.
For example, bringing all countries up to the level of Finland,
OECD best performing country,
will result in gains in the order of 200 trillion dollars,
or, the addition to the GDP
from improving American score to the Canadian score.
Would, by historical pattern,
be enough to resolve the U.S. debt crisis.
In the 21st Century,
no economic graph would look like the one presented by PISA.
Since 2008, we have seen one crisis after the other.
None of them had anything to do with education.
Look at this graph again and tell me,
does anyone here believes
that the next 80 years would look anything like this graph,
even if all countries around the world will get 25 points on Pisa?
I guess not.
So why are we subjugating our children to a test regime
that causes so much cognitive, emotional, social and moral harm?
Why do we agree to put pressure on 15 years old
in ways that erode their ability to enjoy schooling?
Why Instead of nurturing 21st century skills
alongside social and emotional skills
so necessary in the Corona era, we give in to Pisa.
Why do we commercialize our children and market them as human capital
rather than as individuals?
We should than wake up.
Don’t be shocked by the next PISA results
and change your education system accordingly.
Offer other ways of evaluating education and growth.
And yet there is one thing we should learn from all these years of testing.
There is only one correlation which is constant, linear and universal,
and it is between PISA results and economic status.
Poor children who experience social and economic distress
perform less well, in Pisa, as in all other tests.
If we truly want to improve our children’s life,
we should fight poverty,
provide children with protection and support
food and proper health services.
My conclusions are therefore clear.
First, stop the testing regime.
Find other ways of evaluating human skill.
Second, fight poverty.
This can really change the life of millions and millions of children.
And when you think about prosperity and growth,
rather than measuring the average -
measure inclusiveness.
In other words, don’t be tempted to raise the average
by investing in strong students who can easily improve their scores,
invest in poor children, and allow them to flourish.
And finally, set our children free of the PISA regime
and give them the gift of learning.
Thank you.