PISA Report

Posted by: TanyaW on: December 13, 2010

• In: Debate | Education
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by Tanya W.

 

The other day i was asked to go on the radio to chat about the current findings of the OECD (the Organisation for Economic Co-operation Development) PISA survey (Programme of International Student assessment) on students.For those of you who haven’t heard the findings it stats how are reading skills have dropped from 5^th place in 200o to 17^th place. This is the biggest drop of the participating countries. Also maths has dropped form 16^th to 26^th which is the second biggest drop in participating countries. On the science front we have pretty much gone unchanged.

Now you have people arguing that it is due to teaching standards, parents, migrants and even technology. No one wants to take the blame and I don’t think anyone group are responsible. I think they all have contributing factors. The one thing that everyone seems to be agreeing on is that it puts a big black mark on Irish students and completely demolishes the point that the Irish education system is world class.

The one thing that I haven’t heard anyone mention is the government’s spending on education or should I say the lack of it. We are ranked 30^th out of 33 countries when it comes to educational spending. This I believe has a hugh impact on the study others believe that a certain amount of the fall could be down to the fact that over the last few years we have had a significant number of foreign nationals come into the country. As English would not be there first language.

Some people are blaming it on technology and i believe this has a small amount to do with it as there is more distractions and not as many people read fro pleasure.  Yet then you can look at how technology has helped make it easier for students to study and up skill with games on the Nintendo ds for improving your English or grammar. Then there is eBooks which you can download on to a number of different pieces of technology I myself have used for reading or as the girl I was on the radio with she used eBooks to help her prepare for her junior cert. Then there are podcasts for iPods of notes for different subjects.

One thing that is also true in my opinion is teaching standards have dropped in the last few years I believe that teachers just don’t seem to have the dedication towards teaching anymore. The easiest way this is seen is that when you’re in primary school they look at for the people who are having a bit of trouble and get the appropriate help for you but when you’re in secondary schools they don’t notice if you have any problems or if your falling behind as they are just worried with covering the material that is needed for the exams. This i had said to me more than once while i was in school. I think that this leads back to the governments funding that if there was more funding in place there would be a better level of teaching standards.

There is talk that the standards have fallen in Ireland due to parents not having as much interest in there children’s education. I don’t believe this is true if you just look at the number of students that are taking grinds this is obviously showing that parents do have an interest as they are paying for their children to have this extra help.

The one thing that has been said is how the government are going to fix this problem as they have been relying on the fact that we have world class education so we should have a smart economy that is going to pull us out of this situation we are in. So how are we going to get out of this mess if we are not as smart as they had once thought.  It will be interesting we they now realise what damage they have been doing by not investing in education. I don’t anyone thing is to blame but i believe the biggest problem is the lack of funding in the education system as it is true taht we need a smart economy to get us out of this mess.