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Where do you find this? I have read the methodology and nowhere does it say anything about lower level students not taking the test.
It's on page 3
Quote:
The internationally comparable information provided by PISA allows countries to assess how well their 15-year-old students are prepared for life in a larger context and to compare their relative strengths and weaknesses.
As for the Philppines, that is solely a function of the FACT that they were a US colony and that there are four languages spoken in the nation and 80 some odd dialects. The US made English a national language there 70 years ago and more people speak it than Tagalog. They are an interesting but not relevant anomaly."
Improve Student Performance Teaching Language for National Security and American Competitiveness January 2006
CRITICAL NEED FOREIGN LANGUAGE SKILL ARE NECESSARY TO ADVANCE NATIONAL AND GLOBAL COMPETITIVENESS.
1. More than 200 million children in China are studying English, a compulsory subject for all Chinese primary school students. By comparison, only about 24,000 of approximately 54 million elementary and secondary school children in the United States are studying Chinese.
Mine: In China, they have compulsory English classes from the time their kids begin school. Here, if they get any foreign language, it's spotty and incomplete. There, ALL of them get English lessons from primary to secondary school. Here, we're cutting back on allocations for foreign language. The New York Times wrote a piece as to how much language courses have been cut in the US. Going on...
"As Mr. Panetta has been pointing out for years, the United States may be the only nation in the world where it is possible to complete high school and college without any foreign language study, let alone with the mastery of another language. Just 18% of Americans report speaking a language other than English. (The primary reason is due to immigration, legal or not, into the US, not the education system.
lkb0714, I would strongly suggest that the next time you post a link, that you read and understand what it is says before you press a key stroke.
So, getting back to the article's author's original thinking, that US schools are way ahead, I would suggest he go back to k-12, and do what my teachers used to say to us in order to understand a subject, that would, be compare and contrast. Compare and contrast what China is doing with what the US is doing regarding teaching their students foreign languages before he tries to write another sentence for pay.....
Last edited by toobusytoday; 07-01-2012 at 03:02 PM..
Reason: link and a SNIPPET
It says that kids in academic schools are compared to other academic programs and vocational to vocation.
Can you quote where it says this? I linked the methodology in one of my previous posts. I can't find it but I highly doubt that this is how the samples work.
Edit: by the way, even IF that is the case, this is clearly a flaw in the US educational system so you still can't say that US schools are "way ahead" of the rest of the world.
Can you quote where it says this? I linked the methodology in one of my previous posts. I can't find it but I highly doubt that this is how the samples work.
Edit: by the way, even IF that is the case, this is clearly a flaw in the US educational system so you still can't say that US schools are "way ahead" of the rest of the world.
And where did I say the US was way ahead of anything?
What I did and continue to do is point out the statistical inaccuracy of using PISA scores to pronounce hte death toll of American education.
And around page 304 or so they talk about classifying vocational schools vs academic schools as part of their design variability.
And where did I say the US was way ahead of anything?
I was linking my post back to the topic of this thread (^ see title).
Quote:
What I did and continue to do is point out the statistical inaccuracy of using PISA scores to pronounce hte death toll of American education.
And around page 304 or so they talk about classifying vocational schools vs academic schools as part of their design variability.
It would be nice if you read it yourself This is what it says:
Quote:
PISA 2006 collected data on study programmes available to 15-year-old students in each country. This information was obtained through the student tracking form and the student questionnaire. In the final database, all national programmes will be included in a separate variable (PROGN) where the first three digits are the ISO code for a country, the next two digits are the sub-national category, and the last two digits are the nationally specific programme code. All study programmes were classified using the international standard classification of education (ISCED) (OECD, 1999). The following indices are derived from the data on study programmes: programme level (ISCDL) indicating whether students are on the lower or upper secondary level (ISCDE 2 or ISCED 3); programme designation (ISCEDD) indicating the designation of the study programme (A = general programmes designed to give access to the next programme level, B = programmes designed to give access to vocational studies at the next programme level, C = programmes designed to give direct access to the labour market, M = modular programmes that combine any or all of these characteristics; and programme orientation (ISCEDO) indicating whether the programme’s curricular content is general, pre-vocational or vocational.
Now why would they index the different levels of education if they're only testing those on the academic track? And before you lend this too much importance, it is just as relevant as the occupational status of parents, educational level of parents, immigration background, language spoken at home, etc. which are mentioned immediately afterwards (p. 306).
Last edited by toobusytoday; 07-01-2012 at 02:46 PM..
Reason: fixed quotes
[quote=LindavG;24982289]I was linking my post back to the topic of this thread (^ see title).
It would be nice if you read it yourself This is what it says:
Quote:
PISA 2006 collected data on study programmes available to 15-year-old students in each country. This information was obtained through the student tracking form and the student questionnaire. In the final database, all national programmes will be included in a separate variable where the first three digits are the ISO code for a country, the next two digits are the sub-national category, and the last two digits are the nationally specific programme code. All study programmes were classified using the international standard classification of education (ISCED) (OECD, 1999). The following indices are derived from the data on study programmes: programme level indicating whether students are on the lower or upper secondary level (ISCDE 2 or ISCED 3); programme designation indicating the designation of the study programme (A = general programmes designed to give access to the next programme level, B = programmes designed to give access to vocational studies at the next programme level, C = programmes designed to give direct access to the labour market, M = modular programmes that combine any or all of these characteristics; and programme orientation indicating whether the programme’s curricular content is general, pre-vocational or vocational.
I did read it.
Did you? Then those classification are used to weight and scale results. If larger kids are in voc than another it is going to change the weight. It isn't as if they are doing mean. median and mode. The reason their methodology is 300+ pages is because they have done some serious data analysis. And that data analysis includes subjective "massaging" of the data. For most of the world where vocational is a statistically significant portion of the population, this equalizes the effect but for places like the US where most of our low end students still go into academic programs, it is a flaw.
Look at the variables that were used to separate samples, the most common ones? School type, programme and school program.
Additionally, if you look at the actual PISA website, you can compare subsets of groups, as has been done for a huge variety of media acticles. The ones including the general/academic high school scores has nearly all of the US students and only half of Finland and Korea.
Last edited by toobusytoday; 07-01-2012 at 03:08 PM..
Reason: edited out html for clarity
Assessment
In 2009, PISA was a paper-and-pencil assessment that measured 15-year-old students' capabilities in reading, mathematics, and science literacy. Each student took a two-hour assessment. Assessment items include a combination of multiple-choice and open-ended questions that require students to come up with their own response.
Did you? Then those classification are used to weight and scale results. If larger kids are in voc than another it is going to change the weight. It isn't as if they are doing mean. median and mode. The reason their methodology is 300+ pages is because they have done some serious data analysis. And that data analysis includes subjective "massaging" of the data. For most of the world where vocational is a statistically significant portion of the population, this equalizes the effect but for places like the US where most of our low end students still go into academic programs, it is a flaw.
Look at the variables that were used to separate samples, the most common ones? School type, programme and school program.
Additionally, if you look at the actual PISA website, you can compare subsets of groups, as has been done for a huge variety of media acticles. The ones including the general/academic high school scores has nearly all of the US students and only half of Finland and Korea.
So you agree that PISA does test students at the lower level? Remember, you said: "And in many other countries, their lower level students do not take the PISA" and "PISA only looks at those in the academic track" whereas the PISA document clearly states (p. 64) that:
Quote:
The desired base PISA target population in each country consisted of 15-year-old students attending educational institutions located within the country, in grades 7 and higher. This meant that countries were to include (i) 15-year-olds enrolled full-time in educational institutions, (ii) 15-year-olds enrolled in educational institutions who attended on only a part-time basis, (iii) students in vocational training types of programmes, or any other related type of educational programmes, and (iv) students attending foreign schools within the country (as well as students from other countries attending any of the programmes in the first three categories).
I know that. By "lower level" I mean the difference between for example vocational education and academic education for students at the same age.
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This is what it says:
