Copying Singapore’s Math Homework The world needs a network of organizations to help countries learn from each other’s education systems. By Wendy Kopp
http://www.wsj.com/articles/copying-singapores-math-homework-1481153530
Ms. Kopp is the founder of Teach For America and CEO and co-founder of Teach For All, a global network of independent organizations working to expand educational opportunities in 40 countries.
Every three years, hundreds of thousands of teenagers in dozens of countries take an exam that tests their knowledge in science, math, reading, collaborative problem solving and financial literacy. The most recent results, issued this week, provide rich data for determining whether countries’ education systems are high-performing, making progress, or lagging behind. The PISA test is administered by the Program for International Student Assessment, a project of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Here are a few of the success stories from the current report: In Australia, immigrant students perform as well as other children. In South Korea, students from lower-income families perform on a par with wealthier peers. In Vietnam, the academic performance of girls and boys is roughly equitable. And Qatar experienced the fastest progress in math, while Georgia experienced the fastest progress in science.
Unfortunately, experience shows that most countries, including the U.S., fail to make the most of the PISA data. Even though PISA shines a light on policies and practices driving high performance and meaningful progress, only sporadic, ad hoc and generally bilateral opportunities exist to carry knowledge of what’s proving successful in one country to other parts of the world. Most countries write off the opportunity to learn from the highest-performing countries, since they are far away and seem very different. What can the U.S. or Chile, for example, learn from Singapore or Estonia—and vice versa?
The answer is almost certainly a great deal. For an issue like education—which is of enormous importance to global development—this absence of a global approach for fostering the exchange of ideas and best practices is an anomaly. Other global issues such as public health and the environment have robust channels and funding mechanisms for spreading best practices. In education, innovative ideas and new approaches that could benefit students on the other side of the world rarely see the light of day beyond a particular place. CONTINUE AT SITE
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