ensuring u.s. students receive a world-class education

Benchmarking for Success:

Ensuring U.S. Students ReceiveaWorld-Class Education

A report by the National Governors Association,the Council of Chief State School Officers, and Achieve, Inc.

National GovernorsAssociationFounded in 1908, the National Governors Association (NGA) is the collective voice of the nation’s gover-nors and one of Washington, D.C.’s most respected public policy organizations. Its members are the gov-ernors of the 50 states, three territories and two commonwealths. NGA provides governors and theirsenior staff members with services that range from representing states on Capitol Hill and before theAdministration on key federal issues to developing and implementing innovative solutions to public policychallenges through the NGA Center for Best Practices. For more information, visit www.nga.org.

Council of Chief State School OfficersThe Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) is a nonpartisan, nationwide, nonprofit organizationof public officials who head departments of elementary and secondary education in the states, the Dis-trict of Columbia, the Department of Defense Education Activity, and five U.S. extra-state jurisdictions.CCSSO provides leadership, advocacy, and technical assistance on major educational issues.The Councilseeks member consensus on major educational issues and expresses their views to civic and professionalorganizations, federal agencies, Congress, and the public.

Achieve, Inc.Created by the nation’s governors and business leaders,Achieve is a bipartisan, non-profit organizationthat helps states raise academic standards, improve assessments and strengthen accountability to prepareall young people for postsecondary success.At the 2005 National Education Summit,Achieve launchedthe American Diploma Project (ADP) Network, a coalition that has grown to 34 states, educating nearly85% of public school students in the United States.The ADP Network is committed to aligning highschool expectations with the demands of college, career and life.To learn more about Achieve, visitwww.achieve.org.

Copyright 2008, NGA, CCSSO, and Achieve. Copies of this publication are available from:

National Governors Association444 N. Capitol Street NW, Suite 267Washington, DC 20009202-624-5300www.nga.org

Benchmarking for Success:

Ensuring U.S. Students Receivea World-Class Education

A report by the National Governors Association,the Council of Chief State School Officers, and Achieve, Inc.

Foreword 1

Acknowledgements 2

International BenchmarkingAdvisory Group 3

I. Executive Summary 5

II.The Need forAction 9

A Skills-Driven Global Economy 9

Education for Economic Growth 10

The Equity Imperative 12

Other Countries Pulling Ahead 16

III. Five StepsToward Building Globally Competitive Education Systems 23

Action 1: Upgrade state standards by adopting a common core of internationally 24benchmarked standards in math and language arts for grades K-12 to ensure thatstudents are equipped with the necessary knowledge and skills to be globally competitive.

Action 2: Leverage states’ collective influence to ensure that textbooks, digital media, 26curricula, and assessments are aligned to internationally benchmarked standards anddraw on lessons from high-performing nations and states.

Action 3: Revise state policies for recruiting, preparing, developing, and supporting 27teachers and school leaders to reflect the human capital practices of top-performingnations and states around the world.

Action 4: Hold schools and systems accountable through monitoring, interventions, and 30support to ensure consistently high performance, drawing upon international best practices.

Action 5: Measure state-level education performance globally by examining student 31achievement and attainment in an international context to ensure that, over time,students are receiving the education they need to compete in the 21st century economy.

Addressing the Equity Imperative 34

IV.The Federal Role 37

V.Conclusion 39

AppendixA: Countries Participating in InternationalAssessments 41

Endnotes 42

Table of Contents

We are living in a world without borders. To meet the realities of the 21st century global economyand maintain America’s competitive edge into the future, we need students who are prepared to

compete not only with their American peers, but with students from all across the globe for the jobs oftomorrow.

States have voluntarily taken the lead in developing standards-based education, but policymakers lack a criti-cal tool for moving forward—international benchmarking. This report is intended to help states take thenext steps toward ensuring that American students receive a world-class education that positions them tocompete and innovate in the 21st century.

International benchmarking will help state policymakers identify the qualities and characteristics of educationsystems that best prepare students for success in the global marketplace. The stakes are high, and improvingour educational system will require commitment and insight not just from state leaders but many otherstakeholders as well. With this in mind, the National Governors Association, the Council of Chief StateSchool Officers, and Achieve, Inc. have joined to provide to states a roadmap for benchmarking their K-12education systems to those of top-performing nations.

The partners’ recommendations were informed by an International Benchmarking Advisory Group consist-ing of education experts representing education institutions, the business community, researchers, formerfederal officials, and current state and local officials. The Advisory Group’s expertise and experience helpedthe partners identify the need for international comparisons and provide guidance for benchmarking stateeducation system practices in areas such as standards, accountability, educator workforce, and assessments.The partner organizations will work with states to develop and implement these recommendations.

Governors recognize that new economic realities mean it no longer matters how one U.S. state comparesto another on a national test; what matters is how a state’s students compare to those in countries aroundthe globe. America must seize this moment to ensure that we have workers whose knowledge, skills, and tal-ents are competitive with the best in the world.

Governor Janet Napolitano Governor Sonny Perdue Craig R. BarrettArizona Georgia Chairman of the Board

Intel Corporation

Co-Chairs, International Benchmarking Advisory Group

Foreword

Benchmarking for Success: Ensuring U.S. Students Receive a World-Class Education 1

This report was researched and written by Craig D. Jerald, president of Break the Curve Consulting inWashington, D.C.

At the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Ilene Berman, program director in the edu-cation division, and Dane Linn, director of the education division, supervised the project. Leadership and staffof the National Governors Association (NGA), Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO), and Achieve,Inc. played instrumental roles in the project. The following individuals provided useful guidance and feedbackin the development of the report: Achieve, Inc. President Mike Cohen andVice President for Advocacy andOutreach Sandy Boyd; NGA Executive Director Ray Scheppach, NGA Center Director JohnThomasian, NGACommunications Director Jodi Omear, Senior Communications Manager Christopher Cashman, and Educa-tion, Early Childhood andWorkforce Committee Director JoanWodiska; CCSSO Executive Director GeneWilhoit, Deputy Executive Director Scott Montgomery, Legislative Director Scott Frein, and CommunicationsDirector Kara Schlosser. Within the NGA Office of Communications, Publications and Communications Man-ager Andrea Brachtesende provided editing and design assistance.

The partner organizations extend special thanks to the members of the International Benchmarking AdvisoryGroup who offered valuable insights, useful data, and timely review of earlier drafts. The partners alsoacknowledge the contributions of governors’ staff and chief state school officers to the report.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and GE Foundation generously supported the preparation of thispublication.

Acknowledgements

Benchmarking for Success: Ensuring U.S. Students Receive a World-Class Education2

International BenchmarkingAdvisory Group

Benchmarking for Success: Ensuring U.S. Students Receive a World-Class Education

To develop this report, the National Governors Association (NGA), Council of Chief State School Officers(CCSSO), and Achieve, Inc. invited national, state, and local education and policy leaders to serve on an Interna-

tional Benchmarking Advisory Group. The Advisory Group provided the three partner organizations with valuableinsights and helped frame this bipartisan Call to Action. They collectively support the recommendations herein forinternationally benchmarking state K-12 education systems.

Co-Chairs:

Governor Janet Napolitano,ArizonaGovernor Sonny Perdue, GeorgiaCraig R. Barrett, Chairman of the Board, Intel Corporation

Members:

Steven A. Ballmer, Chief Executive Officer, Microsoft Corporation

Governor Donald L. Carcieri, Rhode Island

Mitchell Chester, Commissioner of Education, Massachusetts Department of Elementary andSecondary Education

Christopher Edley, Jr., Dean and Professor of Law, University of California–Berkeley

Chester E. Finn, Jr., President,Thomas B. Fordham Institute

Beverly L. Hall, Superintendent,Atlanta Public Schools

James B. Hunt, Jr., Chairman, the James B. Hunt, Jr. Institute for Educational Leadership and Policy at theUniversity of North Carolina–Chapel Hill and former Governor of North Carolina

Kati Haycock, President,The EducationTrust

Dwight Jones, Commissioner of Education, Colorado Department of Education

GovernorTim Kaine,Virginia

Janet Murguía, President and Chief Executive Officer, National Council of La Raza

Thomas Payzant, Professor of Practice, Harvard Graduate School of Education

Charles B. Reed, Chancellor, California State University

RichardW. Riley, Senior Partner with EducationCounsel LLC, former U.S. Secretary of Education, and formerGovernor of South Carolina

Andreas Schleicher, Head of the Indicators and Analysis Division, Directorate for Education, Organisationfor Economic Co-Operation and Development

William H. Schmidt, University Distinguished Professor, Michigan State University

Vivien Stewart,Vice President for Education,Asia Society

Phillip Uri Treisman, Executive Director,The Charles A. Dana Center at the University ofTexas at Austin

BobWise, President,Alliance for Excellent Education and former Governor ofWestVirginia

3

I. Executive Summary

Around the globe, governments are eagerly com-paring their educational outcomes to the best in

the world. The goal is not just to see how they rank,but rather to identify and learn from top performersand rapid improvers—from nations and states thatoffer ideas for boosting their own performance. Thisprocess, known as “international benchmarking,” hasbecome a critical tool for governments striving to cre-ate world-class education systems.

In American education,“benchmarking” often simplymeans comparing performance outcomes or settingperformance targets (or “benchmarks”). But in busi-ness and among education leaders in other countries,it means much more. The American Productivity andQuality Center puts it this way: “Benchmarking is thepractice of being humble enough to admit thatsomeone else has a better process and wise enoughto learn how to match or even surpass them.”

Countries and states have good reason to make theeffort. Technological, economic, and political trendshave combined to increase demand for higher skillswhile heightening competition for quality jobs. Rule-bound jobs on factory floors and in offices are beingautomated and outsourced. The world’s knowledge-and-innovation economy favors workers who havepostsecondary education or training, strong funda-mental skills in math and reading, and the ability tosolve unfamiliar problems and communicate effec-tively.

At the same time, new technologies and corporatestrategies have opened the global labor market tobillions of people from places like Eastern Europe,India, China, and Brazil who had been left out. Anincreasing variety of work tasks can be digitized andperformed nearly anywhere in the world. More jobsare going to the best educated no matter where theylive, which means that Americans will face morecompetition than ever for work.

International trade agreements, such as China’s mem-bership in theWorldTrade Organization in 2001,have hastened this transformation. Since 1980, globaltrade has grown 2.5 times faster than the global grossdomestic product (GDP). Recent estimates puttoday’s world exports at $12.5 trillion, nearly 20 per-cent of world GDP.

The global economy is here to stay, with recentresearch suggesting that it is evolving and its impactintensifying at a stunning pace. “Globalization is hap-pening faster than people think,” saysVivekWadhwa,Wertheim Fellow at Harvard Law School’s Labor andWorklife program and Duke University Executive inResidence. His recent research shows that compa-nies are no longer just outsourcing production butare farming out innovation as well. “Having India andChina conduct such sophisticated research and par-ticipate in drug discovery was unimaginable even fiveyears ago,” he says.

Education is a tremendously important lever forensuring competitiveness and prosperity in the age ofglobalization, albeit not the only one. Recent eco-nomic studies show that high skills lead to betterwages, more equitable distributions of income, andsubstantial gains in economic productivity. Highermath performance at the end of high school trans-lates into a 12 percent increase in future earnings. Ifthe United States raised students’ math and scienceskills to globally competitive levels over the next twodecades, its GDP would be an additional 36 percenthigher 75 years from now.

The race is on among nations to create knowledge-fueled innovation economies. In Singapore, Germany,China, Brazil, Korea, and other countries around theworld, educational improvement is viewed as a criti-cal part of that mission. Nations and states are there-fore working hard to benchmark their educationsystems to establish a solid foundation for economicdevelopment in the 21st century. Some are findinginnovative ways to measure their students’ progressinternationally. Others are examining high-performingand fast-improving nations to learn about best prac-tices that they then adapt or adopt to improve theirown systems.

American education has not adequately respondedto these new challenges. The United States is fallingbehind other countries in the resource that mattersmost in the new global economy: human capital.American 15-year-olds ranked 25th in math and 21stin science achievement on the most recent interna-tional assessment conducted in 2006. At the sametime, the U.S. ranked high in inequity, with the thirdlargest gap in science scores between students fromdifferent socioeconomic groups.

I. Executive Summary


The U.S. is rapidly losing its historic edge in educa-tional attainment as well. As recently as 1995,America still tied for first in college and universitygraduation rates, but by 2006 had dropped to 14th.That same year it had the second-highest collegedropout rate of 27 countries.

State leaders already are deeply engaged in efforts toraise standards, advance teaching quality, and improvelow-performing schools. International benchmarkingprovides an additional tool for making that processmore effective, offering insights and ideas that cannotbe garnered solely from looking within and acrossstate lines. To that end, the partner organizations andInternational Benchmarking Advisory Group call onstate leaders to take the following actions:

State leaders also should tackle “the equity impera-tive” by creating strategies for closing the achieve-ment gap between students from different racial andsocioeconomic backgrounds in each of the actionsteps above. Reducing inequality in education is notonly socially just, it’s essential for ensuring that theUnited States retain a competitive edge.

Research shows that education systems in the UnitedStates tend to give disadvantaged and low-achievingstudents a watered down curriculum and place themin larger classes taught by less qualified teachers—exactly opposite of the educational practices of high-performing countries.


Action 1: Upgrade state standards by adopting a common core of internationally benchmarkedstandards in math and language arts for grades K-12 to ensure that students are equipped with thenecessary knowledge and skills to be globally competitive.

Action 2: Leverage states’ collective influence to ensure that textbooks, digital media, curricula, andassessments are aligned to internationally benchmarked standards and draw on lessons from high-performing nations and states.

Action 3: Revise state policies for recruiting, preparing, developing, and supporting teachers andschool leaders to reflect the human capital practices of top-performing nations and states around theworld.

Action 4: Hold schools and systems accountable through monitoring, interventions, and support toensure consistently high performance, drawing upon international best practices.

Action 5: Measure state-level education performance globally by examining student achievementand attainment in an international context to ensure that, over time, students are receiving the edu-cation they need to compete in the 21st century economy.

The federal government can play an enabling role asstates engage in the critical but challenging work ofinternational benchmarking. First, federal policymak-ers should offer funds to help underwrite the costfor states to take the five action steps describedabove. At the same time, policymakers should boostfederal research and development (R&D) invest-ments to provide state leaders with more and betterinformation about international best practices, andshould help states develop streamlined assessmentstrategies that facilitate cost-effective internationalcomparisons of student performance.

As states reach important milestones on the waytoward building internationally competitive educationsystems, the federal government should offer a rangeof tiered incentives to make the next stage of thejourney easier, including increased flexibility in the useof federal funds and in meeting federal educationalrequirements and providing more resources toimplement world-class educational best practices.Over the long term, the federal government willneed to update laws to align national education poli-cies with lessons learned from state benchmarkingefforts and from federally funded research.

Nations around the world are facing a new educa-tion imperative, and many are seizing the historicalmoment to provide their citizens with better oppor-tunities and stronger economies.

America must seize this moment too, with statesleading the way. Many states already are workinghard to improve standards, teaching quality, andaccountability, but policymakers lack a critical tool—international benchmarking.

The U.S. can take pride in many aspects of itseducation system, from the high performance of itsteenagers on international civics tests to the strengthof its higher education institutions.

But if state leaders want to ensure that their citizensand their economies remain competitive, they mustlook beyond America’s borders and benchmark theireducation systems with the best in the world. Thestate mandate to educate all students remains, butthe world that students will enter after school haschanged.

For Andreas Schleicher, head of the Indicators andAnalysis Division at the Organisation for EconomicCo-Operation and Development’s Directorate forEducation, the case for adopting a global view toimproving education is undeniable:

It is only through such benchmarking that countriescan understand relative strengths and weaknesses oftheir education system and identify best practices andways forward. The world is indifferent to tradition andpast reputations, unforgiving of frailty and ignorant ofcustom or practice. Success will go to those individualsand countries which are swift to adapt, slow to com-plain, and open to change.


II. The Need forAction

Around the globe, governments are eagerly com-paring their educational outcomes to the best in

the world. The goal is not just to see how they rank,but rather to identify and learn from top performersand rapid improvers—from nations and states thatoffer ideas for boosting their own performance. Thisprocess, known as “international benchmarking,” hasbecome a critical tool for governments striving tocreate world-class education systems.

In American education,“benchmarking” often simplymeans comparing performance outcomes or settingperformance targets (or “benchmarks”). But in busi-ness and among education leaders in other countries,it means much more: Comparing outcomes to iden-tify top performers or fast improvers, learning howthey achieve great results, and applying those lessonsto improve one’s own performance. The AmericanProductivity and Quality Center puts it this way:“Benchmarking is the practice of being humbleenough to admit that someone else has a betterprocess and wise enough to learn how to match oreven surpass them.”1

A Skills-Driven Global Economy

Governments have good reason to benchmark andimprove their education systems. Technological, eco-nomic, and political trends have increased demandfor higher skills while heightening competition forquality jobs. In the U.S., outsourcing and automationhave dramatically altered the mix of jobs in the laborforce. The proportion of American workers in blue-collar and administrative support jobs plummetedfrom 56 percent to 39 percent between 1969 and1999, and the share of jobs requiring more educationand specialized skills—work that is managerial, pro-fessional, and technical in nature—increased from 23percent to 33 percent over the same period.2

Skill demands within jobs are rising as well. A studythat analyzed typical tasks in the American workplacefound that routine manual and cognitive tasks thatfollow a set of prescribed rules are rapidly beingtaken over by computers or workers in other coun-tries. But more sophisticated tasks are on the rise,specifically those that require workers to “bring factsand relationships to bear in problem solving, the abil-ity to judge when one problem-solving strategy is notworking and another should be tried, and the abilityto engage in complex communication with others,”along with “foundational skills” in math and reading.3

Technology is changing not just how work gets done,but also where it can be done. Advances in telecom-munications allow companies to digitize work tasksand products so that jobs can be performed virtuallyanywhere in the world. And new management soft-ware has enabled firms to shift from “vertical” pro-duction—where all tasks are done in sequence in thesame place—to “horizontal” production in whichtasks are carved up and shipped out to whereverthey can be done best and cheapest. The result,according to a blue-ribbon commission reportreleased last year, “is a world in which it is just aseasy to create work teams on four continents as it isto create work teams composed of people from fourdivisions of the same firm located in the same city.”4

While all these changes took place, political and eco-nomic developments opened the doors of this newglobal economy to more than a billion new workersfrom Russia, Eastern Europe, China, India, and otherdeveloping countries who now compete for jobswith those in developed nations. Harvard economistRichard Freeman calls this “The Great Doubling” ofthe global workforce. At first, low-skilled, low-payingjobs were outsourced to these workers, but nowsome higher skilled jobs—from analyzing X-rays totutoring high school students to preparing taxreturns—are migrating abroad, too.5 The twin forcesof globalization and computerization mean that anyjob reducible to a set of scripted rules is vulnerableto outsourcing or automation.6

II. The Need forAction


International trade agreements, such as China’s mem-bership in theWorldTrade Organization in 2001,have sped this transformation along. Although somefirms have long had global links, globalization is nowpervasive: More nations are joining the marketplace,more goods and services are traded globally, andmore of the production process is interconnected ina worldwide supply web. Since 1980, global trade hasgrown 2.5 times faster than the global gross domesticproduct (GDP). Recent estimates put today’s worldexports at $12.5 trillion, nearly 20 percent of worldGDP.7

Recent research suggests that globalization is notonly here to stay, it is evolving and intensifying at arapid pace. In June, Harvard and Duke Universityresearchers published the first in a series of studiesdocumenting how corporations are no longer justoutsourcing production; they are beginning to out-source innovation as well. For example, big pharma-ceutical companies such as Merck, Eli Lilly, andJohnson & Johnson are relying on India and China notonly for manufacturing and clinical trials, but also foradvanced research and development. As a result, sci-entists in those countries are rapidly increasing theirability to innovate and create their own intellectualproperty; the global share of pharmaceutical patentapplications originating in India and China increasedfourfold from 1995 to 2006.8

“Globalization is happening faster than people think,”saysVivekWadhwa, the researcher and former entre-preneur who led the study. “Having India and Chinaconduct such sophisticated research and participatein drug discovery was unimaginable even five yearsago.”9Wadhwa’s team is finding the same kind ofrapid change in a wide range of industries—fromtelecommunications and computer networking toaerospace and computers. Indeed, the NationalAcademy of Engineering recently noted that nearlyall of the top 20 U.S.-based semiconductor compa-nies have opened design centers in India, nine ofthem since 2004.10 “Our take is that the global tech-nology landscape has changed dramatically over thelast decade,” saysWadhwa,“and that we’re at thebeginning of a new wave of globalization.”11

Education for Economic Growth

As a result of these trends,American workers arecompeting not only with skilled workers here, butwith those living in far-away places. Labor economistsFrank Levy and Richard Murnane argue that “overthe long run, better education is the best tool wehave to prepare the population for a rapidly changingjob market.”12 Studies show that higher math per-formance at the end of high school translates intosubstantially higher future earnings; an increase of onestandard deviation in math scores translates into a12 percent boost in wages.13 Family income forhouseholds headed by someone with a collegedegree grew by nearly 40 percent from 1973 to2006, compared with less than 6 percent for familiesheaded by someone with only a high schooldiploma.14

Fortune may favor the prepared mind, but it alsofavors the prepared place—whether that place is anation, a region, or an individual state. To lay a solidfoundation for widespread economic growth, govern-ments around the world are adopting policies alignedwith a 21st century economy that is increasinglyknowledge-fueled, innovation-driven, and global inscope. The Organisation for Economic Co-Operationand Development (OECD) estimates that each addi-tional year of schooling among the adult populationraises a nation’s economic output by between 3 per-cent and 6 percent.15 New studies by Stanford econ-omist Eric Hanushek and others have found strongevidence that high skills lead to elevated individualwages, a more equitable distribution of income, andsubstantial gains in economic productivity.16

Indeed, Hanushek estimates that if the U.S. improvedenough to become a top-performing nation on inter-national assessments between 2005 and 2025, by2037 its GDP would be an additional 5 percenthigher than if skills stayed the same. Improving humancapital pays off even more handsomely over a longertime horizon: By 2080,America’s GDP would be 36percent higher than would be the case if the U.S.remained mediocre in math and science.17


The implications are clear : In today’s world, highwages follow high skills, and long-term economicgrowth increasingly depends on educational excel-lence. Unfortunately,American education has notadequately responded to these challenges. As othercountries seize the opportunity to improve theireducation systems so their citizens can benefit fromnew economic opportunities, the United States israpidly losing its leading edge in the resource thatmatters most for economic success: human capital.

Four decades ago America had the best high schoolgraduation rate in the world, but by 2006 it hadslipped to 18th out of 24 industrialized countries.18

For most of the 20th century, the U.S. set the stan-dard for quality in higher education—and, in manyrespects, it still does. But other countries learnedfrom our success and are now catching up or pullingahead. As recently as 1995 America was still tied forfirst in the proportion of young adults with a collegedegree, but by 2000 it had slipped to 9th and by2006 to 14th—below the OECD average for thefirst time.19 According to the latest OECD figures, theU.S. has one of the highest college dropout rates inthe industrialized world.20

Even if the U.S. improves its high school and postsec-ondary graduation rates, it will be difficult if notimpossible to maintain its historic dominance in thesupply of educated workers. Already,America’s shareof the world’s college students has dropped from30 percent in 1970 to less than half that today.21 Andbecause of their sheer size, China and India will sur-pass both Europe and the United States in the num-ber of secondary and postsecondary graduatesproduced over the next decade.22 Many experts haveconcluded that since the U.S. can no longer competein quantity of human capital, it will have to compete inquality by providing its young people with the highestlevel of math, science, reading, and problem-solvingskills in the world.


But so far American education has not adequatelyresponded to the skills challenge either. Out of 30industrialized countries participating in the OECD’sProgramme for International Student Assessment(PISA) in 2006, the U.S. ranked 25th in math and 21stin science achievement (Figure 1). The performancegap between the United States and top-performingnations is huge:American students lag about a fullyear behind their peers in the countries that performbest in mathematics.23 Even our “best and brightest”cannot compete with excellent students elsewhere.According to the OECD,“the United States does notjust have more students performing badly—it alsohas many fewer students performing well.”24 Amer-ica’s best math students performed worse than thebest math students in 22 other OECD nations.Moreover, only 1.3 percent of U.S. 15-year-olds per-formed at the highest PISA level in mathematics,while among the top 10 countries the share of highperformers was three to seven times as large.25

American students seemed to perform better on themost recentTrends in International Mathematics andScience Study (TIMSS), conducted in 2003. Forexample, fourth-graders scored “above average” inmathematics among participating countries whileeighth-graders scored either above average or aboutaverage depending on the calculation.26 However,when compared only with more developed nationsthat are America’s economic competitors, U.S. per-formance onTIMSS looks more like its performanceon PISA. In 2005, the American Institutes forResearch (AIR) analyzed a group of industrializednations participating in bothTIMSS and PISA; amongthat group, U.S. students consistently performedbelow average across international assessments. “U.S.performance is below the 12-country average atboth low- and high-skill levels and low and high-levelsof item difficulty.”27

American students tend to perform better on inter-national assessments of reading than they do in mathand science. But U.S. 15-year-olds perform only aboutaverage among industrialized countries, and fourthgraders’ reading scores have stagnated while othercountries have made sizeable gains. “Reforms aimedat improving reading achievement seem to have pro-pelled Russia, Hong Kong, and Singapore from middleto top rankings [on the Progress in International

Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS)],” EducationWeekreported last year, “even as U.S. performance stoodstill.”28

Moreover, a 2003 PISA assessment of students’ abilityto solve real-world problems found that fewer thanhalf of U.S. 15-year-olds are analytical problem-solvers who can communicate well about solutions.Among 29 industrialized nations, the U.S. had the fifthhighest percentage of very weak problem-solversand the sixth lowest percentage of strong problem-solvers.29 Such results suggest that U.S. schools notonly are failing to provide many students with strongfoundational skills in subjects like math and science,but they also are not providing enough students withthe broader skills that the modern workplaceincreasingly demands.

Schools also must find ways to provide students withthe “global awareness” that the globalization of workrequires.30 To collaborate on international workteams, manage employees from other cultures andcountries, and communicate with colleagues andclients abroad,Americans will need to know andunderstand much more about the rest of the worldthan they do now.31 “A pervasive lack of knowledgeabout foreign cultures and foreign languages threat-ens the security of the United States as well as itsability to compete in the global marketplace and [to]produce an informed citizenry,” the National Acad-emy of Sciences warned last year.32

The Equity Imperative

Some might argue that it is enough to produce thenext generation of elite “rocket scientists” who caninvent new technologies and spur innovation. Thereis a widespread belief that providing America’s topstudents with a world-class education is the singlemost important way to boost economic growth. Thisnotion is often paired with a conviction that focusingon educational equity for all sacrifices excellence forthe few who are already advanced. But these aremyths. Our national commitment to closing achieve-ment gaps is not only compatible with a global com-petitiveness agenda, it is essential for realizing thatagenda.



Figure 1: U.S. 15-Year-Old Performance Compared with Other Countries

Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA)Average is measurably higher than the U.S.Average is measurably lower than the U.S.

Source: Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development and U.S. Department of Education.

Mathematics (2006)Rank Score

1 Finland 5482 Korea 5473 Netherlands 5314 Switzerland 5305 Canada 5276 Japan 5237 New Zealand 5228 Belgium 5209 Australia 52010 Denmark 51311 Czech Republic 51012 Iceland 50613 Austria 50514 Germany 50415 Sweden 50216 Ireland 50117 France 49618 United Kingdom 49519 Poland 49520 Slovak Republic 49221 Hungary 49122 Luxembourg 49023 Norway 49024 Spain 48025 United States 47426 Portugal 46627 Italy 46228 Greece 45929 Turkey 42430 Mexico 406

OECD average 498

Science (2006)Rank Score

1 Finland 5632 Canada 5343 Japan 5314 New Zealand 5305 Australia 5276 Netherlands 5257 Korea 5228 Germany 5169 United Kingdom 51510 Czech Republic 51311 Switzerland 51212 Austria 51113 Belgium 51014 Ireland 50815 Hungary 50416 Sweden 50317 Poland 49818 Denmark 49619 France 49520 Iceland 49121 United States 48922 Slovak Republic 48823 Spain 48824 Norway 48725 Luxembourg 48626 Italy 47527 Portugal 47428 Greece 47329 Turkey 42430 Mexico 410

OECD average 500

Reading (2003)Rank Score

1 Finland 5432 Korea 5343 Canada 5284 Australia 5255 New Zealand 5226 Ireland 5157 Sweden 5148 Netherlands 5139 Belgium 50710 Norway 50011 Switzerland 49912 Japan 49813 Poland 49714 France 49615 United States 49516 Denmark 49217 Iceland 49218 Germany 49119 Austria 49120 Czech Republic 48921 Hungary 48222 Spain 48123 Luxembourg 47924 Portugal 47825 Italy 47626 Greece 47227 Slovak Republic 46928 Turkey 44129 Mexico 400

OECD average 494

Problem Solving (2003)Rank Score

1 Korea 5502 Finland 5483 Japan 5474 New Zealand 5335 Australia 5306 Canada 5297 Belgium 5258 Switzerland 5219 Netherlands 52010 France 51911 Denmark 51712 Czech Republic 51613 Germany 51314 Sweden 50915 Austria 50616 Iceland 50517 Hungary 50118 Ireland 49819 Luxembourg 49420 Slovak Republic 49221 Norway 49022 Poland 48723 Spain 48224 United States 47725 Portugal 47026 Italy 46927 Greece 44828 Turkey 40829 Mexico 384

OECD average 500

Recent studies offer compelling evidence that educa-tional equity is just as important for economic com-petitiveness as it is for social justice. Hanushek andcolleagues specifically analyzed economic data toanswer this question: “Which is more important forgrowth—having a substantial cadre of high perform-ers or bringing everyone up to a basic level of per-formance?” They found that to truly maximizegrowth, it is not enough to produce a high-achievingelite; a nation’s economic success also depends onclosing achievement gaps to ensure that all studentsattain a solid foundation of knowledge and skills.33

Another recent study of 14 developed countriesconcluded that “increasing the average level of liter-acy will have a greater effect on growth than increas-ing the percentage of individuals who achieve highlevels of literacy skills.”34

But the U.S. has a long way to go before it achievesthat goal. While American 15-year-olds rank in thebottom-third of developed nations in overall perform-ance in math and science, they rank in the top-thirdwhen it comes to gaps between students from differ-ent family backgrounds.35 In fact, the difference in sci-ence scores between students from differentsocioeconomic backgrounds is bigger in the UnitedStates than in almost any other country.36 Fortunately,international assessments also show that it is possibleto realize high average performance alongside moreequitable performance. Across several continents,countries like Japan, Korea, Finland, and Canadademonstrate that students from disadvantaged back-grounds need not automatically perform poorly inschool.37

Learning how some countries achieve performancethat is both higher and more equitable has tremen-dous implications in this country given America’s long-term demographic outlook. Demographers nowpredict that “minorities” will constitute the majority ofschoolchildren by 2023 and of working-age Americansby 2039.38 In 2006, U.S. Hispanic15-year-olds per-formed below the average of every OECD countryexceptTurkey and Mexico in science literacy, and blackstudents performed even worse (Figure 2).39 Amer-ica cannot remain competitive if half of its populationgraduates from high school so poorly prepared that itis unable to thrive in the global knowledge economy.States that plan to grow their economies must findways to close their achievement gaps.

Of course, some critics of international assessmentsclaim that America’s disappointing performance isinevitable precisely because of its demographic chal-lenges. But the data do not support such beliefs:Overall, U.S. 15-year-olds are slightly above the inter-national average when it comes to families’ social,economic, and cultural status.40 The problem is thatAmerica’s education system does a poor job sup-porting students and offering equal learning opportu-nities. According to OECD, in 2006, the U.S. rankedfourth out of 30 countries in the relative impact thatsocioeconomic background had on students’ PISAscience achievement.41 Another recent study measur-ing the impact of family background onTIMSS resultsfound a similar pattern: “The U.S. falls in the top quar-ter of the most unequal countries.”42


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Figure 2: U.S.Minority Performance BelowAverages of Most Industrialized Nations

Source: Baldi, S.,Y. Jin., M. Skemer, P.J. Green, and D. Herget. Highlights from PISA 2006: Performance of U.S. 15-Year-Old Students in Science and Mathematics Literacy inan International Context. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, December 2007, pp. 6 &15.

Other Countries Pulling Ahead

America’s global position is slipping not because U.S.schools are getting worse. Rather,America is losingground because its educational outcomes havemostly stagnated while those in other countries havesurged. Nations that formerly lagged far behind theU.S. have caught up with and in some cases even sur-passed it.

Korea, for instance, has gone from well behind to sig-nificantly ahead of the United States in high schoolattainment in just a few generations—an educationtriumph that has helped fuel the country’s tremen-dous progress (Figure 3). In 1960, Mexico’s eco-nomic productivity was twice as large as Korea’s, butby 2003 Korea’s GDP was twice as large as Mexico’s.According to theWorld Bank,“the contribution ofknowledge … was a key factor in Korea’s miracle ofrapid economic growth.”43

Other countries have made rapid strides in buildingcompetitive knowledge-and-innovation economies.“At the end ofWorldWar II, a single nation stoodatop Mount Innovation, and it was the United States,”notes former Harvard Business School professorJohn Kao in his 2007 book Innovation Nation. “Now,powerful new climbers have emerged to challengeU.S. supremacy. … Some may be surprising—Brazil,Denmark, Estonia, Finland, New Zealand, Singapore,andTaiwan.”44 Not surprisingly, some of those samenations also top the list of countries achieving highperformance or seeing big gains on internationalassessments.

“Young Chinese, Indians, and Poles are not racing usto the bottom,”NewYork Times columnist ThomasFriedman observed in 2005. “They do not want towork for us; they don’t even want to be us. Theywant to dominate us—in the sense that they want tobe creating the companies of the future ….”45

These governments are giving their people an edgeby making major efforts to improve K-12 education.Between 2000 and 2006, Poland increased its PISAreading achievement by 29 points—almost a year’sworth of learning—while decreasing the proportionof achievement variation across schools from 51 per-cent to 12 percent. Improving average skills whiledecreasing the achievement gap is no accident:Poland’s major education reforms are now bearingfruit.46

Some countries are working hard to compare theirperformance internationally and to use those com-parisons to drive improvement. Mexico plans to linkits national assessment to PISA and has set presiden-tial targets for 2012 and for 2030. Brazil has bench-marked every secondary school against PISA so thateach one receives two scores—one benchmarked tothe national metric and one benchmarked to PISA.The goal is to have all Brazilian secondary schoolsachieving at the international average by 2021.“Instead of spending years complaining that theydon’t do well, they turned it around to talk aboutwhat to do about it and to measure progress,” saysAndreas Schleicher, head of the Indicators and Analy-sis Division at OECD’s Directorate for Education.47

Many nations are going beyond performance tobenchmark their policies and practices with theworld’s top performers—and making major strategicchanges as a result. When Germany received disap-pointing results on the PISA 2000 assessment, leaderscommissioned a team of experts from high-perform-ing and innovative countries to investigate best prac-tices and provide advice. In 2003, the Germangovernment launched a $4.6 billion package of edu-cation reforms, including a program to expand learn-ing time by introducing 10,000 all-day schools acrossthe country.48 And by 2004, Germany’s 16 Länder(states) began to adopt common, jointly developed“national education standards”—something that pre-viously had been considered politically daunting if notimpossible.49


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Source: Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development. Education at a Glance 2008. Paris: OECD,September 2008, p. 43,Table A1.2a.


United States Korea

Germany is not alone in its response to internationalassessment results. A recent evaluation of the policyimpact of PISA found that the assessment has had amajor influence on educational policy and practice inmany OECD countries, most notably on educationalstandards and curricula as well as on systems of eval-uation and accountability.50

Countries have responded toTIMSS and PIRLSresults as well. A 2005 study found that 10 out of 18developing nations had changed their science curric-ula in response to theTIMSS 1999 results, and eighthad changed their math curricula—including “relocat-ing into grade 8 topics that had been taught later.”51

Hong Kong’s reading reforms, which boosted itsfourth-grade PIRLS achievement from significantlybelow the U.S. to significantly above it, were enactedin response to disappointing results on the 2001assessment.52 Singapore’s impressive math and sci-ence performance onTIMSS assessment is hardly amistake; rather, the outcomes resulted from majoreducation reforms the country launched in responseto poor performance on the Second InternationalScience Study (a precursor ofTIMSS) in the mid-1980s.53

Vivien Stewart, vice president of the Asia Society, saysshe is often impressed by the openness and eager-ness of education leaders in other countries to learnfrom and apply international best practice. “Singa-pore is currently at the top and China is rapidlyimproving and India is just beginning to improve, butthey are all very interested in using international bestpractices,” she says. “China, before it engages in anyreforms, will send teams to examine best practicesaround the world. Although this is mostly done atthe national level, it’s increasingly done at theprovince level too. China is doing this with avengeance because they traditionally have been cutoff from the rest of the world, and they want tocatch up quickly. A lot of the Chinese curriculumreforms are based on looking at systems in otherparts of the world.”54

China’s educational efforts are well matched with itseconomic aspirations. In 2006, the country’s EleventhFive-Year-Plan put technological innovation squarelyat the center, emphasizing the need to develop a“rich talent base” and calling for the government to“cultivate talents with creativity and completelyimprove our capacity of self-innovation so top univer-sities in China will become an important force forthe establishment of an innovation nation.”55 A July2008 study found that the University of California,Berkeley had been displaced by not one but twoChinese universities as the top undergraduate feederinstitutions for U.S. Ph.D. programs.56 In addition,while America could once expect talented foreignersstudying here to stay and contribute to the U.S.economy after graduation, foreign-born specialistseducated in this country are increasingly returninghome to take advantage of new economic opportu-nities in their own countries.

Many other regions and nations are working tobenchmark and improve education to attract high-skilled, high-paying jobs. In 2000, the European Union(EU) heads of state adopted the goal of becoming“the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world,” encouraging membernations to introduce a host of education and otherreforms. Since then, the EU has adopted educationalgoals that are internationally benchmarked, and pub-lishes an annual report that allows national leaders tocompare results within Europe as well as with theU.S. and other countries around the world. The 2008edition emphasizes the critical role of internationalbenchmarking:“All Member States can learn from thebest performers in the Union.…This is why theCouncil asked for the three best performing coun-tries (leaders) in specific policy areas to beidentified.”57


Such attitudes stand in stark contrast to the UnitedStates, which so far has largely ignored the interna-tional benchmarking movement in education. “TheU.S. education system in general is very introverted,”observes Sir Michael Barber, a former top educationofficial in Great Britain who now focuses on interna-tional benchmarking at McKinsey and Company, aglobal management consulting firm.58 The U.S. partici-pates in far fewer international benchmarking studiesthan do many other countries, especially comparedwith those working hardest to improve. In June, agroup of governors attending an NGA- and HuntInstitute-sponsored seminar on educational competi-tiveness learned that the U.S. is the only OECD coun-try with a federal-style education system where moststate leaders have no regular and reliable informationto compare student performance internationally.

Barber argues that will need to change if the U.S.wants to remain competitive. “All around the world,”he says,“governments are seeking insights into howto improve education systems, and many understandthat the only way for a country or a state to keep upglobally is to look at what’s happening with best prac-tice around the world.”59

Of course, the U.S. education system has strengths aswell as weaknesses, and plenty to teach other coun-tries. For example, U.S. ninth-graders scored wellabove average on the 1999 Civic Education Study,ranking sixth out of 28 countries overall and first instudents’ ability to critically interpret political informa-tion. Moreover, the U.S. was one of only two coun-tries whose students scored above average not onlyin civics content, but also on measures of positivecivic engagement and attitudes.60 Clearly, educators inemerging democracies can look to the U.S. for les-sons in how to prepare students for active civicengagement.

Many countries also find much to admire aboutAmerica’s higher education system and reformsaround the globe have been informed by the U.S.“You have created a public-private partnership in ter-tiary education that is amazingly successful,” Singa-pore’s Education MinisterTharman Shanmugaratnamtold Newsweek in 2006. “The government providesmassive funding, and private and public colleges com-pete, raising everyone’s standards.” Moreover, someAsian countries have looked to U.S. schools for ideason how to encourage innovation and risk taking.“America has a culture of learning that challengesconventional wisdom, even if it means challengingauthority,” says Shanmugaratnam. “These are theareas where Singapore must learn from America.”61

But the U.S. cannot afford to rest on its past accom-plishments. The global knowledge economy is here,and if state leaders want to ensure that their citizenscan compete in it, they must seize the initiative, look-ing beyond America’s borders and benchmarkingtheir education systems with the best in the world.The state mandate to educate all students remains,but the world that schools are preparing studentsfor has changed—and will continue to change—dramatically.

OECD’s Schleicher says the case for adopting aglobal perspective on improving education isundeniable:

It is only through such benchmarking that countriescan understand relative strengths and weaknesses oftheir education system and identify best practicesand ways forward. The world is indifferent to tradi-tion and past reputations, unforgiving of frailty andignorant of custom or practice. Success will go tothose individuals and countries which are swift toadapt, slow to complain, and open to change.62


Myth: Other countries test a more select, elite group ofstudents.

Reality: That might have been true for early interna-tional assessments, but it is no longer true today. Accord-ing to Jim Hull, who examined international assessments forthe National School Boards Association,“Since the 1990s,due to better sampling techniques and a move by morecountries to universal education, the results represent theperformance of the whole student population, includingstudents who attend public, private, and vocational schools,students with special needs, and students who are notnative speakers of their nation’s language.”63

While the U.S. still sets a relatively high age for compulsoryeducation among OECD nations, that does not automati-cally translate into higher rates of school enrollment. U.S.enrollment rates in primary and secondary education arethe same as or below those in other industrialized nations.For example, among OECD member nations, the U.S.ranks only 22nd in school enrollment of 5- to 14-year-oldsand 23rd in enrollment of 15- to 19-year-olds.64

Moreover, on the most recent PISA assessment, OECDmember nations on average tested a higher proportion of15-year-olds than did the U.S. (97 percent versus 96 per-cent of those enrolled in schools, and 89 percent versus 86percent of the entire 15-year-old population), which refutesthe idea that the U.S. was disadvantaged by testing abroader population.65While no assessment is perfect, PISA,TIMSS, and PIRLS all have tight quality-control mechanisms,including very strict and transparent guidelines for samplingstudents and administering assessments. All exclusionsmust be thoroughly documented and justified, and totalexclusions must fall below established thresholds.

Myth: The U.S. performs poorly because of poverty andother family factors.

Reality: According to the U.S. Department of Education,the U.S. looks about average compared with other wealthynations on most measures of family background.66 Amongthe OECD’s 30 member nations, U.S. 15-year-olds areslightly above the international average on a compositeindex of economic, social, and cultural status (ESCS); only 11percent of U.S. students fall within the lowest 15 percent ofthe ESCS internationally.67 Moreover,America’s most affluent15-year-olds ranked only 23rd in math and 17th in scienceon the 2006 PISA assessment when compared with affluentstudents in other industrialized nations.68 In fact, when theOECD uses statistical methods to estimate how PISAscores would look if the ESCS index were equalized acrossall countries—a leveling of the playing field—U.S. perform-ance actually looks worse rather than better.69

This is not to say that demographics are unimportant inAmerican schools: The U.S. ranks high in the impact thatfamily background has on student achievement (fourth outof 30 countries),70 in part because its education systemdoes a particularly poor job supporting students and equal-izing learning opportunities. For example, a 2006 study pub-lished in the European Journal of Political Economy found thatout of 18 developed nations, the U.S. is the only countrywhere weaker students are more likely to be enrolled inlarger classes.71 Another study found that the U.S. has oneof the largest gaps in access to qualified teachers betweenstudents of high and low socioeconomic status.72

Myth: Cultural factors prevent U.S. students from performingas well as those in other nations, particularly Asian countries.

Reality: U.S. 15-year-olds reported spending more timeon self study or homework in science, math, and readingthan did students on average across the 30 OECD nationstaking the 2006 PISA assessment, including those in Japanand, except for math, in Korea.73 Moreover, high-performingnations and states can be found all over the world, not justin Asia. For example, the five top-scoring nations in the2006 PISA science assessment were located on four differ-ent continents, reflecting a range of cultures: Europe (Fin-land), North America (Canada),Asia (Japan), and Oceania(New Zealand and Australia).

Singapore is often singled out for its top performance ontheTIMSS math assessment, which some say must be dueto an unusually strong work ethic. But that belief was chal-lenged in a 2005 study by the American Institutes forResearch (AIR):“Singaporean students are hardworking, butif Singapore’s success is attributable only to work ethic,how can we account for the fact that its high achievementis a comparatively recent development? On the SecondInternational Science Study in the mid-1980s, Singaporeanfourth graders scored only 13th out of 15 participatingnations, and Singaporean eighth graders did no better thantheir U.S. counterparts …. In response to these poorscores, Singapore’s Ministry of Education re-engineered andstrengthened the education system, reforming both the sci-ence and mathematics curriculum.”74

Countries such as Finland, Korea, and Hong Kong haveachieved major improvements in learning outcomes overtime without changing their national cultures. In fact, asrecently as the mid-1980s Finnish students performed onlyabout average among OECD nations on tests used at thetime.75 Hong Kong instituted numerous reading reformsthat boosted its fourth-graders’ performance from signifi-cantly below the U.S. in 2001 to significantly above it in2006.76

Myths and Realities about International Comparisons


Of course, cultural attitudes can play a role in achievement.Studies conducted in the 1980s found that mothers andstudents in some Asian countries were likely to attributesuccess in math more to effort than to innate ability, whilethe reverse was true for Americans.77 But experimentalstudies have shown that students’ beliefs can be changed inways that positively impact learning; the National Mathe-matics Panel recommended that such strategies be usedmore widely in American classrooms.78

Myth: Other countries are less diverse.

Reality: The U.S. is a diverse nation, but that diversityshould not prevent states from improving student achieve-ment. Among the 11 other OECD countries that like theU.S. had more than 10 percent immigrant students, all ofthem performed higher in math and nine performed higherin science.79 And Singapore, which scored at the top of themost recentTIMSS math assessment, is not as homoge-neous as many assume. According to the 2005 AIR report,“Arguments about Singapore’s homogeneity are not per-suasive. ... Singapore has three major ethnic groups. Aboutthree-fourths of Singapore’s population is Chinese, butalmost a quarter is Malay or Indian. Like the United States,Singapore experienced serious ethnic strife in the 1960s.”80

Cultural homogeneity has been cited as a factor in Finland’shigh achievement in that it lends itself to a great deal ofagreement about education and education reform. But Fin-land’s success also is attributable to very different educa-tional policies and practices in areas like teacherrecruitment and student support.81

Myth:Wealthier countries spend more than the U.S. oneducation.

Reality: The U.S. is wealthier and spends more on edu-cation than most other countries. Among the OECD’s 30member nations, the U.S. ranks highest in GDP per capitaand second highest in educational expenditures.82 A reporton the U.S. economy published by OECD last yearobserved, “On average, and relative to other OECD coun-tries, U.S. students come from well-educated, wealthy fami-lies and … go to schools that are unusually well-financed.Given any of these factors, U.S. students might be expectedto be among the world leaders.”83 However, while the U.S.ranks high in education spending, it ranks only near themiddle of OECD nations in its “effort” to fund educationwhen expenditures are compared with wealth (grossnational product).84

Myth: U.S. attainment rates cannot be compared with othercountries’ because the U.S. tries to educate many more students.

Reality: The U.S. does rank higher than average onaccess to higher education, but that does not explain itsvery low college-completion rates. While America’s entryrate for four-year and advanced postsecondary programsexceeds the OECD average by 10 percentage points (64percent to 54 percent), its college “survival rate” trails theOECD average by 17 points (54 percent to 71 percent).85

According to OECD,“Comparatively high drop out rates inthe United States are [negatively] contributing to theUnited States’ relative standing against other countries” ineducational attainment.86

Myth: Education does not really affect the economy anyway.A Nation at Risk warned that America’s economy would suf-fer, but that never happened.

Reality:While A Nation at Risk erred in linking therecession of the early 1980s to educational stagnation(other factors such as the business cycle are more impor-tant over the short term), the report was correct thatimproving education is critical to America’s economic com-petitiveness. New research based on extensive data frommany countries over several decades confirms that cogni-tive skills as measured by international tests strongly influ-ence long-term economic growth.87

Other factors matter too, of course. In fact,America’s his-toric advantages in other areas have made up for its stu-dents’ mediocre skills and allowed the U.S. to grow itseconomy without significantly improving its schools. First,the sheer size of the U.S. and its much earlier investment inmass secondary and postsecondary education gave it a sig-nificant numerical advantage in human capital. Second, itsopen and agile economy, flexible labor markets, and intel-lectual property protections enabled industry to make bet-ter use of the human capital available.88

But those historic advantages are eroding as other coun-tries imitate the U.S. example. America already has lost itslead in educational attainment, and many countries areinstituting economic reforms. “Eventually, our competitorswill narrow our economic lead as they learn how to createtheir own versions of agility and scale,” says economistAnthony Carnevale. “At that point, the competition willreally come down to who has the best human capital.”89


III. Five Steps Toward Building GloballyCompetitive Education Systems

States have both the authority and the responsibil-ity to provide students with a high-quality educa-

tion, and state leaders already are deeply engaged inefforts to raise standards, improve teaching quality,and help low-performing schools and studentsimprove. For example, 34 states now belong to theAmerican Diploma Project Network, an initiativededicated to making sure that every high schoolgraduate is prepared for college or work. In thosestates, governors, state superintendents of education,business executives, and college leaders are workingto improve high school standards, assessments, andcurricula by aligning expectations with the demandsof postsecondary education and work.

International benchmarking provides an additionaltool for making every state’s existing education policyand improvement process more effective, offeringinsights and ideas that cannot be garnered by exam-ining educational practices only within U.S. borders.State leaders can use benchmarking to augment their“database of policy options” by adding strategies sug-gested by international best practice to the range ofideas already under consideration. Indeed, interna-tional benchmarking should not be a stand-aloneproject, but rather should function as a critical andwell-integrated component of the regular policy plan-ning process.

The following action steps were carefully chosen tohelp states focus their efforts on the policy areas thathave both a high impact on student performance andalso a high potential for best practice learning—inother words, where existing research has shown sig-nificant differences in how high-performing nations orstates organize education compared with traditionalapproaches in most U.S. states. However, this shouldnot be viewed as a static checklist. Benchmarking is aprocess of discovery as well as adaptation, and stateleaders should keep an open mind as they collectinformation on practices abroad to expand their pol-icy toolkits.

For example, action steps two through four addressthe major elements of what can be thought of as the“instructional delivery system”—the people, tools,and processes that translate educational expectationsinto teaching and, ultimately, into learning for stu-dents. Other countries have shown that all of theseelements can be tightly aligned and focused throughsystematic reform, so they should not be consideredin isolation. And because benchmarking is meant tobroaden the policy lens, revealing lessons that mightnot be apparent in a limited state or national context,state leaders should be attuned to all the ways thatother nations are delivering instruction more effi-ciently and effectively—from educational technologyto school finance to governance.

Finally, higher education leaders should be asked tojoin international benchmarking efforts as full partici-pants so existing initiatives are better coordinatedwith pre–K-12 and higher education policies throughP-16 councils and other mechanisms. For example,higher education plays a key role in the recruitmentand training of teachers and an increasingly impor-tant role in ensuring that high school graduation stan-dards reflect college- and career-readinessrequirements. Partnering with higher education alsowill facilitate a robust discussion about college gradu-ation rates, which are very low in the United Statesand have contributed to the erosion of America’spreeminence in higher education. Since the responsi-bility probably lies both with K-12 preparation andwith higher education practice, leaders from bothsectors should work together to ensure that attain-ment rates are internationally competitive.

III. Five StepsToward Building GloballyCompetitive Education Systems


The Action Steps

Action 1: Upgrade state standards by adopting acommon core of internationally benchmarked stan-dards in math and language arts for grades K-12 toensure that students are equipped with the neces-sary knowledge and skills to be globally competitive.

Research has revealed striking similarities among themath and science standards in top-performing nations,along with stark differences between those world-class expectations and the standards adopted by mostU.S. states. According to Bill Schmidt, a Michigan StateUniversity researcher and expert on internationalbenchmarking, standards in the best-performingnations share the following three characteristics thatare not commonly found in U.S. standards:

Focus.World-class content standards cover asmaller number of topics in greater depth atevery grade level, enabling teachers to spendmore time on each topic so that all studentslearn it well before they advance to more difficultcontent. In contrast, state content standards inthe U.S. typically cover a large number of topicsin each grade level—even first and second grade.U.S. schools therefore end up using curricula thatare “a mile wide and an inch deep.”

Rigor. By the eighth grade, students in top-performing nations are studying algebra andgeometry, while in the U.S., most eighth-grademath courses focus on arithmetic. In science,American eighth-graders are memorizing theparts of the eye, while students in top-perform-ing nations are learning about how the eyeactually works by capturing photons that aretranslated into images by the brain.90 In fact, thecurriculum studied by the typical Americaneighth-grader is two full years behind the curricu-lum being studied by eighth-graders in high-performing countries.91

Coherence. Math and science standards in top-performing countries lay out an orderly progres-sion of topics that follow the logic of thediscipline, allowing thorough and deep coverageof content. In contrast, standards in many U.S.states resemble an arbitrary “laundry list” of

topics, resulting in too much repetition acrossgrades. “In the United States the principle thatseems to guide our curriculum development isthat you teach everything everywhere,” saysMichigan researcher Schmidt,“because thensomehow somebody will learn something some-where.”92

To upgrade state standards, leaders will be able toleverage the Common State Standards Initiative, anupcoming joint project of NGA, CCSSO,Achieve, theAlliance for Excellent Education, and the James B.Hunt, Jr. Institute for Educational Leadership and Pol-icy. The initiative will enable all states to adopt coher-ent and rigorous standards in K-12 math, reading, andlanguage arts that are fully aligned with college andcareer expectations and also internationally bench-marked against leading nations. Achieve is developingan important tool for the initiative: a set of voluntary,globally competitive reference standards based onthe existing American Diploma Project (ADP) frame-work. Because of how it was originally developed, theADP framework already reflects the skills necessaryto succeed in college and in well-paying jobs intoday’s labor market. Achieve is now working to fur-ther calibrate the framework to reflect internationalexpectations as well as recent research on collegeand career readiness.

A key goal of the initiative will be to ensure that stan-dards reflect all three of the critical dimensionsexemplified by high-performing nations—not onlyrigor but also focus and coherence. In a study pub-lished last year, Schmidt and a colleague found thattrying to cover too many topics per grade clearly hasa negative influence on student learning, even whenthe order of topics is otherwise coherent. At theeighth-grade level, the researchers found “a decreaseof fifty in the number of intended topics and gradecombinations would predict an increase in achieve-ment of almost three-fourths of a standard deviation.…The amount of ‘clutter’ created by covering toomany topics … must be kept small.”93 Therefore, theinternationally benchmarked common core of stan-dards should not be seen as an addition to existingstandards, but rather the foundation for states toestablish rigorous standards that also are fewer andclearer (Figure 4).



Whole number meaningWhole number operationsMeasurement unitsCommon fractions

Equations and formulasData representation and analysis2-D geometry: basicsPolygons and circles

Perimeter, area and volumeRounding and significant figuresEstimating computationsProperties of whole number operations

Estimating quantity and sizeDecimal fractionsRelationship of common and decimal fractionsProperties of common and decimal fractions

PercentagesProportionality conceptsProportionality problems2-D coordinate geometry

Geometry: transformationsNegative numbers, integers, and their propertiesNumber theoryExponents, roots and radicals

Exponents and orders of magnitudeMeasurement estimation and errorsConstructions w/ straightedge/ruler and compass3-D geometry

Congruence and similarityRational numbers and their propertiesPatterns, relations, and functionsSlope and trigonometry

Intended by 67 percent of the 21 statesIntended by 83 percent of the 21 statesIntended by all of the 21 states

Topic Grade Grade Grade Grade Grade Grade Grade Grade1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Source: Schmidt,W.H., C.H.Wang, and C.C. McKnight. Curriculum Coherence:An Examination of U.S. Mathematics and ScienceContent Standards from an International Perspective. Journal of Curriculum Studies 37, no. 5, 2005, pp. 525-559. (p. 541, Figure 4)

Figure 4: MathematicsTopics in Content Standards of 21 States

Bold yellow lineshows contentcoherencetypical of top-performingcountries

Action 2: Leverage states’ collective influence toensure that textbooks, digital media, curricula, andassessments are aligned to internationally bench-marked standards and draw on lessons from high-performing nations and states.

Research shows that top-performing countries sup-port rigorous, coherent standards with a wide rangeof tightly aligned instructional tools—from assess-ments to classroom curriculum materials. In the U.S.,while each state retains its own authority to makedecisions in those areas, states can more efficientlyreflect international best practice by working cooper-atively on ways to upgrade those elements of theirstandards-based education systems.

Assessment offers a good example. Top-performingcountries administer assessments that are more rigor-ous and better aligned with standards than the testsU.S. students typically take. For example,AIR foundthat Singapore’s math assessments expect greaterrigor and depth in mathematical knowledge; to testthat knowledge, they employ fewer multiple choicequestions and more problems that require multistepsolutions and finding unknowns. In fact, Singapore’ssixth-grade assessment proved more challenging thanthe eighth-grade math tests given in seven states aswell as the eighth-grade National Assessment ofEducational Progress.94

Such assessments typically are more expensive todevelop and administer than the multiple-choiceexams commonly used in the U.S. However, statescan save time and money by sharing resources andexpertise to develop high-quality voluntary assess-ments or a common pool of assessment items. Thatkind of collective effort also can ensure the availabil-ity of voluntary assessments or assessment items thatare aligned with the internationally benchmarkedstandards to be developed through the CommonState Standards Initiative.

The same is true when it comes to the components ofthe curriculum. Schmidt and colleagues found that thecoherence typical of math standards in high-performingcountries “is translated into textbooks, workbooks,diagnostic tests for teacher use, and other classroommaterials that enable teachers to bring the curriculuminto the classroom in a relatively consistent, effectiveway. In turn, the curriculum serves as an importantbasis for the nation’s preservice teacher education andfor ongoing professional development.”95

While textbooks are only one of many kinds ofinstructional tools, they usefully illustrate the powerof state collaboration to address international bestpractice. Researchers have found that U.S. textbooks,compared with those used in high-performing coun-tries, are less aligned with standards and much lessfocused and coherent in the topics they cover. “If youlook at U.S. textbooks,” Schmidt and colleaguesobserve,“you’ll find there is no textbook in the worldthat has as many topics as our mathematics text-books, bar none.”96 For example, common elemen-tary math textbooks in the U.S. cover almost twice asmany topics per grade as do Singapore’s. As a result,math textbooks in Singapore expect students tocomplete about one thorough lesson on a singletopic per week, while U.S. students are expected tocomplete about one lesson on a narrowly focusedtopic each day.97

The problem is not simply a lack of focus and coher-ence in individual state standards, but also a lack ofagreement across state standards. Publishers of mathtextbooks market them nationally by cramming themwith enough topics to cover states’ widely divergentstandards. The Common State Standards Initiativepartly solves this problem by providing a morefocused and coherent set of expectations aroundwhich to develop textbooks and digital media. Byworking in concert to address concerns about length,focus, and coherence with commercial publishers,states can ensure that new expectations for text-books, digital media, and other instructional materialsare being addressed by the industry.


Finally, states can pool resources to develop entirelynew tools, such as replacement units or diagnosticassessments that align with internationally bench-marked standards. In doing so, leaders should collab-orate to ensure that curriculum supports takeadvantage of the newest technologies, including mul-timedia strategies, to support instruction. HarvardBusiness School professor Clayton Christensen pre-dicts that by 2019 half of all high school courses willbe delivered online.98 Some research indicates thatcountries are pursuing a wide range of strategies andgoals to encourage the use of computers and infor-mation technology for instruction, suggesting thatthere might be much to learn in this area from inter-national benchmarking.99

Action 3: Revise state policies for recruiting, prepar-ing, developing, and supporting teachers and schoolleaders to reflect the human capital practices of top-performing nations and states around the world.

Beyond establishing world-class educational stan-dards, high-performing nations also adopt policies toensure that students receive the best instruction pos-sible. Recent studies have identified major differencesin how top-performers and fast-improvers recruit,train, and support their teachers and school leaderscompared with the policies in place in most U.S.states. Tackling these challenges can yield big divi-dends. Studies by U.S. researchers have found thatassigning students to strong teachers for three yearsin a row can boost their test scores by as much as 50percentile points above what they would gain withthree ineffective teachers in a row.100

According to a study by Sir Michael Barber andMona Mourshed of McKinsey and Company, thebest-performing nations begin by recruiting top talentto the teaching profession: Korea recruits from thetop 5 percent of graduates, Finland the top 10 per-cent, and Singapore the top 30 percent. The McKin-sey researchers found that some countriesaccomplish this by setting a high initial bar and limit-ing access to teacher training to prevent an oversup-ply of candidates—especially weak ones—which,along with other strategies, raises the status of theprofession and aids in recruitment.101 “Finns havecome to cherish good educators asTexans do acequarterbacks,” Kao writes in Innovation Nation.102

In contrast, the U.S. teacher pipeline seems to dis-courage individuals with competitive academic skillsfrom entering and remaining in the profession. Col-lege students with high SAT and ACT scores are lesslikely to train to become teachers, less likely to take ateaching job, and less likely to stay in the classroomafter a few years.103 The likelihood that a highly tal-ented female in the top 10 percent of her graduatingclass would become a teacher shrank by half, fromabout 20 percent to about 10 percent, between1964 and 2000.104

Top-performing nations and provinces also use arange of strategies to provide teachers with excellenttraining and ongoing professional development—both of which are mostly mediocre in the UnitedStates. An international study released last year bythe International Association for the Evaluation ofEducational Achievement (IEA) and Michigan StateUniversity found that college students preparing tobe teachers have weaker knowledge of mathematicsand take less rigorous math courses than those inother countries. “What’s most disturbing is that oneof the areas in which U.S. future teachers tend to dothe worst is algebra, and algebra is the heart of mid-dle school math,” say Bill Schmidt, who directed thestudy.105

Top-performing nations are going well beyondrecruitment and initial training to build a 21st centuryteaching force, however. According to Schleicher andStewart,“These countries are abandoning the tradi-tional factory model, with teachers at the bottom ofthe production line receiving orders from on high, tomove toward a professionalized model of teachers asknowledge workers. In this model, teachers are on apar with other professionals in terms of diagnosingproblems and applying evidence-based practices andstrategies to address the diversity in students’ inter-ests and abilities.”106 Such countries recognize thatquality of classroom instruction is the most criticalelement of any education system, and they work tobuild cultures that combine high expectations withstrong support and empowerment of teachers.


However, bolstering teacher professionalism does notmean asking teachers to create everything fromscratch. Korea’s Institute for Curriculum and Evalua-tion operates aTeaching and Learning Center thatoffers information about the national curriculum; pro-motes aligned instructional practices; and provideseducators with a wide range of teaching materials,guidelines, and assessment tools.107 The New ZealandMinistry of Education has supported development oftools for formative assessment, including AssessmentTools forTeaching and Learning, which can be usedto assess literacy and numeracy of upper elementaryand lower secondary students, as well as national cur-riculum exemplars in all subject areas. Teachers usethe tools to evaluate the impact of instruction onstudent learning and adjust teaching to better meetstudents’ needs.108

Based on conversations with many local educatorsacross the United States, EducationTrust PresidentKati Haycock underscores that benchmarking effortsshould consider the immediate concerns of class-room teachers: “What do the leading countries dowith children who arrive behind?What is interna-tional best practice for improving the performance oflanguage minorities? How do teachers differentiateinstruction without losing sight of rigorous stan-dards?”109 Since educators ultimately will be responsi-ble for ensuring that students meet the new globallycompetitive standards, policymakers should take careto incorporate such questions into their benchmark-ing research.

Top nations and states also focus on developingexcellent school leaders and charge principals withensuring that teachers provide consistently high-quality instruction. The state ofVictoria in southeast-ern Australia recently implemented an intensive strat-egy to improve educational leadership that has beendubbed “cutting edge” by international experts. Thestrategy is closely aligned with the state’s comprehen-sive effort to improve schools and includes a rigorousprincipal selection process; mentoring programs fornew principals and a coaching program for experi-enced ones; a “balanced scorecard” approach to prin-cipal performance management; an acceleratedprogram for high-potential leaders; and a program todevelop high-performing principals. The governmenthas established 19 separate leadership-developmentopportunities, each firmly rooted in research andbest practice (Figure 5).110

Singapore’s approach to developing leaders is widelyadmired too. Singapore screens prospective schoolleaders using a rigorous process and then provides asix-month training program run by the National Insti-tute of Education. The program includes manage-ment and leadership courses from leading executivetraining programs; one day per week spent in schoolsto come up with innovative solutions to practicalproblems; group projects; two-week overseas place-ments with major corporations; and rigorous evalua-tion.111 Great Britain recently revamped its nationalapproach to developing principals based on a carefulstudy of that model.112

Sir Michael Barber emphasizes that there are impor-tant lessons for improving teaching and leadershipthat can be adapted and applied across nations—andvigorous policy efforts can result in rapid improve-ments. When the British government surveyed adultsaged 24 to 35 in the year 2000 about switching jobs,teaching ranked 92nd out of 150 career choices. Butin a follow-up survey conducted in 2005, afterimprovements to teacher training coupled with a vig-orous marketing campaign, teaching came out ontop.113 “Our benchmarking suggests that the samebroad policies are effective in different systems irre-spective of the cultural context in which they areapplied,” Barber and Mourshed conclude in theirreport.114 U.S. state leaders could learn much fromsuch examples; particularly during the current eco-nomic downturn, there might be many adults withstrong content backgrounds who could be inducedto switch to a career in teaching.

In the U.S., costs related to human capital account forthe vast majority of education spending. The goal forinternational benchmarking should be to ensure themost effective and efficient use of funds for prepara-tion, recruitment, training, ongoing development, andsupport. This will require a careful examination ofhow higher education institutions and systems in top-performing countries are structured to encourageyoung people to enter the teaching field and preparethem to become quality instructors at the elemen-tary and secondary level.



Figure 5: Leadership Development Opportunities in Victoria, Australia

Name of Programme

Master in School Leadership

Building capacity forimprovement

Building the capacity ofschool leadership teams

Leading across effectivesmall schools

Leading in effective schools(strategic planning)

Preparing for leadership

Leading for student learning

Leading professional learning

Scholarships for postgraduatestudy

Eleanor Davies schoolleadership programme

Leaders in the making

Stepping up to theprincipalship

Educational leadership:shaping pedagogy

Human leadership: developingpeople

Technical leadership: thinkingand planning strategically

Mentoring for first timeprincipals

Coaching to enhance thecapabilities of experiencedprincipals

Development programme forhigh performing principals

Building the capacity of theprincipals of small schools

Teachers professional leave

Source: Matthews, P., H. Moorman, and D. Nusche. In Pont, B., D. Nusche, and D. Hopkins (Eds.), Improving School Leadership,Volume 2: Case Studies on SystemLeadership. Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development, Paris: OECD, 2008, pp. 179–213. (p. 196, Box 7.5)

Open to

All after 5 years teaching

Teams of teachers

School leadership teams

Small school teams

High potential leaders

Experienced teachers

Expert teachers

Professional developmentcoordinators

Postgraduate teachers

Female leading teachers / APs

Assistant principals

Assistant principals

APs and principals

APs and principals

APs and principals

First time principals

Experienced principals

Principals

Principals of small schools

All teachers

Description

Taught modules, in-school elements andmentoring or shadowing; 2 years

Briefing, residential and day workshops, coachingsupport and feedback; 1 year

Three-day residential, action research in school,3 coaching sessions, follow-up workshop; 1 year

Three 1-day forums, action learning project,Web-based support, mentor with small schoolexperience; 1 year

Briefing, preparatory activities and 360-degreefeedback, two workshops, 4 coaching sessionsand ongoing e-mail contact; 1 year

Two-day conference, four-day workshops, backgroundreading, pre- & post-programme 360-degreefeedback, school based project, shadowing; 1 year

Five days workshops, reading and data collection,360-degree feedback, peer learning groups; 1 year

One year part-time programme

Range of postgraduate courses

Five months including mentoring, reading,seminars, school based project

One year with workshops and strategicplanning project

One year, including data-collection, workshop,shadowing, reviews

One year, including preparation, intensiveworkshop, review, feedback, action planning

One year, development and implementationof a professional learning plan

One year, including strategic planning project

One year

One year with assigned coach

Over a two-year period including contribution tosystem development and individual professionaldevelopment

One year

30 days

Aspirantleaders

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

Assistantprincipals

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

Principals

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

√

Action 4: Hold schools and systems accountablethrough monitoring, interventions, and support toensure consistently high performance, drawingupon international best practices.

Top-performing nations exhibit a wide range of differ-ent approaches to the functions commonly definedin the U.S. under the rubric of “accountability.” Butrecent research suggests that such nations share sev-eral key strategic priorities and employ a broaderrange of tools for managing those priorities than isevident in this country.

First, most high-performing nations use multiplemechanisms to monitor school performance, includ-ing annual student assessments in key grades andwhole-school reviews or “inspections.” Such inspec-tions evaluate the performance of a school against abroad set of criteria, including, but not limited to, stu-dent achievement and also examine the school prac-tices that contribute to student results. Inspectionstake many different forms in different countries,including annual reviews conducted by an externalagency; annual self evaluations complemented by anexternal review every few years; and self reviews cou-pled with external reviews on a much more occa-sional basis, often initiated by schools themselves.115

NewYork City recently adopted a system of schoolinspections based on the British model.116

One advantage of such an approach is that leaderscan more precisely diagnose the root causes ofunderperformance and, consequently, better matchinterventions with specific needs. According to abenchmarking report commissioned by Achieve forthe state of Ohio, the British system “takes accountof each school’s day-to-day working and its capacityfor change.…When [the Office for Standards inEducation] finds poor student outcomes and poorquality leadership, for instance, it calls for strongermeasures than it would for a school with bad testscores but competent leadership.”117

Second, some top-performing countries haveadopted policies to ensure that every student suc-ceeds by monitoring students’ progress and interven-ing to prevent them from falling too far behind. InFinland, every school employs “special educationteachers” who receive additional training to provide

individual or small-group support to students whoneed it, mainly in Finnish language arts and mathe-matics. On average, about 30 percent of studentsreceive such additional help every year, sometimeseven the best students. The goal is to identify anystudent who is having difficulty at a particular point intime and get that student caught up and able to han-dle a rigorous classroom curriculum.118

In Singapore, schools use a national examination toidentify upper elementary grade students who arehaving difficulty in math. Those students then receivespecial instruction based on an adapted curriculumframework taught by trained Mathematics SupportTeachers. Importantly, they also receive about 30 per-cent more math instruction than their peers so thatthey can cover the same rigorous content, only at aslower pace.119

According to Schleicher and Stewart, many of thecountries that perform well on PISA have establishedstrong norms and mechanisms to support students.Teachers in such countries “don’t have the option ofmaking students repeat the school year—retention isnot permitted—or transferring students to schoolswith lower performance requirements,” they say.“Even where retention or transfers are technicallypossible, incentive structures for teachers and schoolsencourage teachers to address and solve challengesrather than hand them to others.”120

Moreover, a thoughtful approach to accountabilitycan help ensure that students experience a curricu-lum consistent with state standards and also that aca-demic expectations do not vary too much acrossschools and classrooms. Even though Finland has aneducational culture that greatly values the autonomygranted to local educators, its government recentlytightened the national core curriculum after evalua-tions revealed too many gaps between students’classroom grades and their assessment results.“Another reason for the new approach is the factthat students use their final school reports in basiceducation when applying to upper secondary educa-tion institutions,” says Reijo Laukkanen of the FinnishNational Board of Education. “Thus, the new rulesalso safeguard the equality of students.”121


Finally, top-performing nations balance accountabilitywith greater school autonomy. A number of studiesbased on PISA,TIMSS, and PIRLS have found that stu-dents perform better in systems that give schoolsgreater freedom to hire and reward teachers, pur-chase supplies and make other school-specific budgetallocations, and choose curriculum materials andteaching methods.122 Those studies also show thatdecentralization works best when it is combined withvarious forms of accountability. According to oneteam of researchers, the positive impact of schoolautonomy coupled with choice and accountabilityamounts to more than one-and-a-half grade-levelequivalents on the PISA assessment.123

In general, however, there is still much to learn aboutforms of accountability in other nations. One areathat states might examine closely as part of theirbenchmarking work is how other nations use assess-ment for accountability. What kinds of assessmentsdo they administer in which grades and subjects?What content and skills do those tests measure?What kinds of questions do they use—multiplechoice or more open-ended problems? How areassessments scored? And how are the results pub-lished and used for accountability purposes?

Action 5: Measure state-level education perform-ance globally by examining student achievement andattainment in an international context to ensure that,over time, students are receiving the education theyneed to compete in the 21st century economy.

As states establish world-class standards and adoptother policies based on international best practice,leaders will want information on whether studentsare benefiting from the changes and are meetinghigher expectations. “States are no longer competingwith just the states next door but with countriesaround the world,” arguesVivien Stewart. “Their stu-dents are competing with students in Singapore,Shanghai, and Salzburg; it’s important to have a senseof whether they are being prepared to thrive in aglobal, knowledge-based economy.”124 Over time suchdata also can help prevent newly upgraded, interna-tionally benchmarked state standards from slippingback below globally competitive levels.

In most industrialized countries with a federal-styleeducation system, state leaders already have access tothat kind of information because most take part inPISA at state levels and some also participate inTIMSS.

In the U.S., governors and chief state school officerswould welcome the opportunity to compare studentperformance internationally. However, state leadersare concerned about the number of tests studentsalready are required to take for various purposes aswell as the costs of administering additional assess-ments. Currently the U.S. is characterized by an overlycumbersome and fragmented testing system in whichthe federal government, states, districts, and schoolstogether administer many different assessments tomeet a wide variety of purposes.

Therefore, states can best address this action stepthrough cooperative action to find a streamlined andcost-effective solution for generating internationalstudent achievement comparisons. Since all statesalready are required to participate in the NationalAssessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), leaderscan use their collective leverage to work with theNational Assessment Governing Board (NAGB) toexplore the feasibility of upgrading NAEP to yieldresults that are comparable with existing internationalassessments such asTIMSS, PIRLS, and PISA. Thestrategy should permit states to secure representa-tive school-level samples to analyze the relationshipbetween school-level practices and student achieve-ment, which in turn would enable leaders to craftpolicies promoting more widespread use of effectivepractices.

Adapting NAEP to yield internationally comparableresults will be easier to accomplish in the case ofTIMSS and PIRLS. TIMSS is more closely aligned withNAEP, and they both assess students in math and sci-ence in grades four and eight. Similarly, PIRLS testsstudents in reading in grade four, though a recent U.S.Department of Education study found that PIRLSincorporates easier reading passages than NAEPwhile also assessing some kinds of reading tasks thatNAEP does not.125

Since PISA assesses 15-year-olds in participatingnations, NAGB would need to explore how to adjustNAEP samples to include a comparable group ofyoung people, as well as how to incorporate themore open-ended assessment items that characterizePISA. (PISA relies on “constructed response” itemsover multiple choice questions by a margin of two toone, while the reverse is true forTIMSS and NAEP.126)However, many consider PISA to be an importantcomplement toTIMSS and PIRLS because, while themajority of countries participating inTIMSS are low-


and middle-income countries, PISA focuses on thelead industrialized countries that are the main eco-nomic competitors of the United States (AppendixA, pg. 41). In addition, PISA assesses students nearthe end of compulsory education on whether theycan apply what they have learned in math, science,and reading to solve real-world problems.

Governors, chief state school officers, and other lead-ers also should work to develop assessments thatindicate whether students are on track for collegereadiness. The best example of such an initiative isCalifornia’s Early Assessment Program (EAP), a col-laborative effort among the California State Board ofEducation, the California Department of Education,and California State University (CSU). EAP allowsstudents to take an additional component of theGrade 11 California StandardsTest in reading andmathematics. The results provide an “early warning”that signals the student’s college-readiness status; stu-dents who meet the benchmark are exempt fromhaving to take the CSU placement test, which is nor-mally given to students after they enroll.127 Fourteenstates in the American Diploma Project Network aredeveloping a common end-of-course exam for Alge-bra II that is intended to serve the same purpose.

Of course, each state has the authority to make itsown decisions regarding assessment and leadersalways can choose to administer one or more of theexisting international tests. For many policymakers,the most significant difference betweenTIMSS andPISA is in the type of content and skills each assesses.According to an analysis by the U.S. Department ofEducation,“TIMSS and NAEP appear to have themost in common, with a focus on material that ismore likely to be taught through the school curricu-lum than PISA, which is more situation and phenom-ena-based. …TIMSS and PISA differ in a number ofrespects, including a greater focus on factual knowl-edge in mathematics and science inTIMSS than inPISA, and a greater focus on problem solving and thecritical evaluation of information in PISA than inTIMSS. Moreover, PISA has a greater focus on dataanalysis, statistics and probability in mathematics thaneitherTIMSS or NAEP [Table 1].”128

Some U.S. states already have participated in theTIMSS assessment, including Massachusetts and Min-nesota in 2007. The IEA and the U.S. Department ofEducation are working to develop cost models forvarious levels of state participation in the next admin-

istrations ofTIMSS and PIRLS in 2011. While no U.S.state has yet participated in PISA, most federal educa-tion systems around the world—including Australia,Belgium, Canada, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Spain,Switzerland, and the United Kingdom—have workedwith OECD to report PISA results for states orprovinces. Across OECD nations, state-level resultsare generated using a variety of strategies, offering U.S.states several proven models to consider.

A few nations and states have experimented withapproaches that do not require students to take thefull international assessment every few years. Oneoption is to embed a selection of PISA orTIMSS itemsinto existing state assessments. Another is to generatea statistical “link” using NAEP tests that can then beused to estimate state PISA orTIMSS performance.Such options are less expensive, and in practice areless burdensome on schools that must administer thetests, but what they save in dollars, time, and effort,they sacrifice in depth of data, since policymakers willnot be able to dig beneath overall averages.

In addition to achievement, state leaders shouldgather information to compare educational attain-ment with top-performing and fast-improving nations,starting with indicators published by the OECD in itsannual Education at a Glance report. Many of the rawdata necessary are already collected by federal statis-tical agencies. For the OECD’s 2008 report, theUnited States provided comparable data on the fol-lowing key indicators:

• Percentage of 25- to 34-year-olds who haveattained at least a high school degree;

• Percentage of 25- to 34-year-olds who haveattained a postsecondary degree;

• Upper secondary graduation rate;

• Postsecondary entry rate;

• Postsecondary graduation and completion rates;and

• Number of postsecondary science degree holdersper 100,000 employed among 25- to 34-year-olds.

Finally, state leaders should create an explicit plan toensure that their investment yields more than a newset of numbers—including a strategy for communi-cating the results; a strategy for analyzing the resultsto dig beneath averages and identify significant pat-terns, strengths, and weaknesses; and the designation



Sponsor

Grades or ages tested

Subjects tested

Content tested

Testing cycle

Last administration

Next administration

Cost for state participation

Type of test questions

Sub-topics for whichscores are reported

Technical alignment withNAEP: Can scores beequated to NAEP?

Nations participating

PISA

Organisation for EconomicCo-Operation and Development

15-year-olds

Math, science, and reading everythree years; special problem solvingassessment in 2003

Ability to apply math, science, andreading to solve real-world problems

Every 3 years

2006

2009

2009: $250,000 to $550,000depending on level of participation

About two-thirds constructedresponse and one-third multiplechoice

Math (2003):Quantity; space andshape; change and relationships;uncertaintyScience (2006): Overall knowledge;knowledge about earth and space;knowledge about living systems;knowledge about physical systems;identifying scientific issues; explainingphenomena scientifically; usingscientific evidenceReading (2000): Retrieving informa-tion; interpreting texts; reflection andevaluation

Little alignment; not enough to cross-walk scales and scores

TIMSS

International Association forthe Evaluation of EducationalAchievement

Fourth and eighth graders

Math and science

Attainment of knowledgeand skills in math and sciencecurriculum

Every 4 years

2007

2011

2007: $600,000 for full participa-tion including both 4th and 8thgrades, or $350,000 for a fullsample in just one grade2011: To be determined

About one-third constructedresponse and two-thirdsmultiple choice

Math: Grade 4–Number; pat-terns and relationships; measure-ment; geometry; data. Grade8–Number; algebra; measure-ment; geometry; dataScience: Grade 4–Life science;physical science; earth science.Grade 8–Life science; chemistry;physics; earth science; environ-mental science

Significant alignment; enough forsome researchers to crosswalkscales and scores*

PIRLS

International Association forthe Evaluation of EducationalAchievement

Fourth graders

Reading

Reading comprehension skills

Every 5 years

2006

2011

2011: To be determined

About one-half constructedresponse and one-half multiplechoice

Reading for literary purposes;reading for informationalpurposes; retrieving andstraightforward inferencing;interpreting, integrating, andevaluating

Unknown

* See for example Phillips, G.W. (2007). Chance Favors the Prepared Mind: Mathematics and Science Indicators for Comparing States and Nations.Washington, DC:American Institutes for Research.

Please refer to Appendix A for a complete list of countries participating in each.

Table 1. TheThree Major InternationalAssessments

of an agency or agencies responsible for collectingadditional information and making recommendationsfor improvement.

Addressing the Equity Imperative

Rather than addressing equity as an isolated actionstep, state leaders should approach it as an overarch-ing or “interdisciplinary” imperative as they tackleeach of the action areas described above. Recentresearch shows that other nations arrange their edu-cation systems more equitably. For example, the U.S.falls short across the following dimensions:

• An opportunity gap in access to qualified teachersthat is among the largest in the world;129

• The only country where lower performing stu-dents and children with less-educated parents arelikely to be taught in larger classes;130 and

• Math teachers less likely than those in high-performing countries to include conceptualstrategies along with basic computation for low-achieving students.131

In other words, education systems in the UnitedStates tend to give disadvantaged and low-achievingstudents a watered down curriculum in larger classestaught by less qualified teachers—exactly the oppositeof what high-performing countries do.

States could greatly improve their repertoire of pol-icy strategies for promoting academic equity byexamining specific strategies in other countries. Korea,for example, has two major policies for encouragingmore equal access to qualified teachers. First, teach-ers are rotated within districts on a regular basisevery five years. Second, the government offers edu-cators a wide range of attractive incentives to teachin remote areas and regions with disadvantaged pop-ulations, including smaller class size, less in-classteaching time, salary stipends, the chance to choosethe next school placement, and a competitive advan-tage when seeking administrative positions.132

Many high-performing countries also provide inten-sive, targeted academic supports to students, such asthe Finnish and Singaporean intervention strategiesdescribed above. The Finnish example is particularlyinteresting in that it is one of four overlapping “layers”of intensifying interventions for students who fallbehind. The first line of attack is formed by regular

classroom teachers who receive intensive training todeal with diverse learning challenges through teacherpreparation internships, which might deal with “stu-dents performing at different levels to the specialneeds of immigrant children to more difficult cases offetal alcohol syndrome or attention deficit hyperactiv-ity disorder.”133

The second line of attack is made up of classroomteaching aides who often work with individuals orsmall groups of students, followed by the highlytrained “special education” teachers described above.Finally, students whose lack of progress is due to fam-ily or social difficulties outside of school can bereferred to “multi-disciplinary teams.”134 According toa recent case study by the OECD,“Overall, theseapproaches to minimizing the number of studentsfalling behind display two features: intensification(providing more time by more instructors) and alter-native approaches (rather than ‘more of the same’) ...But they do so in consistent ways, working with theclassroom teacher on the specific subjects studentsare having trouble with, rather than relying on a grabbag of after-school programs and tutoring effortsrandomly distributed by grade levels and subjects.”135

Such supports continue through lower secondaryeducation, including a “class teacher” who follows aparticular group of students for three years to moni-tor individual progress.136 Indeed, when Finland endedearly tracking of students and moved toward a moreequitable system in the 1980s, leaders realized thatlower secondary education would be a problem spotin the pipeline where vulnerable students might falloff track, so they specifically targeted greater fundingtoward the lower secondary grades—and continueto do so today (Figure 6).137

Some would argue that the U.S. cannot learn fromFinland because it is a more equitable countrysocially and economically. However, it is telling thatFinland’s commitment to equity does not stop at theschoolhouse door; rather, the education system itselfhas been carefully constructed to maximize equityand ensure consistently high levels of performancefor all students. According to an OECD report oneducational equity best practices published last year,“Many countries could usefully follow the successfulFinnish approach to learning difficulties, offering asequence of intensifying interventions which drawback into the mainstream those who fall behind.”138



Figure 6: FinlandTargets FundsToward Lower SecondaryWhereNeedsAre Greatest

Primary Lower Secondary Upper Secondary

Source: Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development. Education at a Glance 2008. Paris: OECD, September2008, p. 219,Table B1.1a. Figures represent annual expenditure on educational institutions per full-time equivalent stu-dents for all services in 2005, in equivalent U.S. dollars converted using purchasing power parity for gross domestic product.

Annu

alex

pend

iture

pers

tude

nt

$5,557

$9,156$8,875

$9,899

$6,441

$10,969

$0

$2,000

$4,000

$6,000

$8,000

$10,000

$12,000

Finland United States

IV. The Federal Role

If benchmarking were only about measuring andcomparing outcomes, the federal governmentmight be able to play a leading role. However,because benchmarking is also—and most critically—about improving policy, states must take the lead.States have primary authority over the policy areasthat other nations are most eager to benchmark andimprove: standards, assessments, curriculum, and theeducation workforce. States already have led in rais-ing standards, with 16 having adopted a commoncore of college- and career-ready expectations inmath and reading for high school graduation.

The United States is not alone in this regard. Coun-tries such as Canada,Australia, Germany, and Spainhave federal-style education systems where statesretain a great deal of authority over education. And inmany of those countries, states are taking a leadingrole in benchmarking educational performance andpolicies. For example, the public outcry over mediocreresults on the 2000 PISA assessment led to a historicnew partnership between Germany’s federal govern-ment and its 16 Länder (states), with the Länder takingresponsibility for the establishment of shared educa-tion standards and assessments for schools across thenation while the federal government provided sup-port for those and other state reforms.

America can learn from that example, too: Whilestates must take the lead, the federal government canhelp. And the federal government can do that bestby playing an enabling role grounded in a new visionfor the historic state–federal partnership in educa-tion—one that is less restrictive and mandate-drivenand more encouraging of innovation. As states takeon the important work of benchmarking their educa-tion systems to the best in the world, the federalgovernment can assist states in specific ways at eachstage of the journey:

• As soon as possible, the federal government shouldoffer new funding or allow existing funds to beused to help underwrite the cost for states to takethe five action steps described above related tostandards and assessment, curriculum, human capi-tal, and accountability.

• At the same time, the federal government shouldincrease its own investment or focus existingresources toward better research and develop-ment in this area to provide state leaders withmore and better information about tools for

benchmarking and international best practice ineducation. For example, the U.S. Department ofEducation should:

1) Support efforts to collect and share interna-tional achievement and attainment data rele-vant to states; help state leaders identify goodcomparison nations or provinces for bench-marking; and collect and disseminate informa-tion about best practices of high-performingand fast-improving nations and provincesaround the world; and

2) Convene a technical advisory committee onassessment to make recommendations for gen-erating internationally benchmarked results bystate without adding significantly to costs andtesting time. The committee should disseminateuseful technical information about existingassessments, share policy options for improvingand streamlining state assessment systems, andreview the feasibility of adapting NAEP to gen-erate international comparisons as describedabove.

• As states reach important milestones on the waytoward building internationally competitive educa-tion systems, the federal government should offer arange of tiered incentives to make the next stage ofthe journey easier. With accountability at the corefor greater results, such incentives could include:

1) Increased flexibility in the use of federal funds;

2) Increased flexibility in meeting requirements ofexisting federal education laws so that statesare not thwarted in their efforts to adapt andadopt international best practices; and

3) Additional funds to help states implementworld-class practices.

• Over the long term, the federal government shouldchange existing federal laws to align national educa-tion policies with the lessons learned from statebenchmarking efforts and from federally fundedresearch.

Over time, the combination of better information,additional support, and more flexibility for innovationwould greatly accelerate state progress in developingand implementing world-class education systems. Andthat, in turn, will benefit all Americans, safeguardingU.S. economic security and ensuring continued pros-perity in the new global economy.

IV. The Federal Role


V.Conclusion

Other nations have benefited from America’s historic example by expanding educational opportunities fortheir own citizens. Now it is time for U.S. leaders to ensure that Americans develop the skills they need

to compete—and help the U.S. remain competitive—in a rapidly changing world.

The federal government can help, but states must lead. They must look beyond their borders and America’sshores to fully understand how to benchmark expectations for student learning. They must significantlybroaden the policy lens by drawing lessons from the highest performing, most equitable, and fastest advancingnations and states around the globe and adapting the very best educational practices to incorporate here athome.

If states in other countries can shape the response to the global education imperative, states in America mustdo so as well. And state leaders have both the authority and an obligation to ensure that students attendglobally competitive schools and school districts. America cannot maintain its place in the world—economi-cally, socially, or culturally—unless all of its students gain the skills that allow them to compete on a globalscale. The United States will only achieve true international competitiveness when state education policies andinstitutions are restructured to meet 21st century realities.

V.Conclusion


AppendixA:Countries Participating inInternationalAssessments

AppendixA:Countries Participating inInternationalAssessments

Benchmarking for Success: Ensuring U.S. Students Receive aWorld-Class Education 1

PISA 2009 TIMSS 2007 PIRLS 20064th 8th

AfricaAlgeria X XBotswana XDjibouti XEgypt XGhana XMorocco X X XSouth Africa X XTunisia X X XAsiaAzerbaijan XBahrain XChineseTaipei X X X XDubai (UAE) XHong Kong SAR X X X XIndonesia X X XIran, Islamic Republic X X XIsrael X X XJapan X X XJordan X XKazakhstan XKorea, Republic of X XKuwait X X XKyrgyzstan XLebanon XMacao-China XMalaysia XMongolia X XOman XPalestinian Authority XQatar X X X XSaudi Arabia XShanghai (China) XSingapore X X X XSyria XThailand X XTurkey X XUzbekistan XYemen XSouth AmericaArgentina XBrazil XChile XColombia X X XDominican Republic XPanama XPeru XTrinidad andTobago XUruguay XOceaniaAustralia X X XNew Zealand X X X

PISA 2009 TIMSS 2007 PIRLS 20064th 8th

EuropeAlbania XArmenia X XAustria X X XBelgium X XBosnia & Herc XBulgaria X X XCroatia XCyprus X XCzech Republic X X XDenmark X X XEngland X X X XEstonia XFinland XFrance X XGeorgia X XGermany X X XGreece XHungary X X XIceland X XIreland XItaly X X X XLatvia X X XLiechtenstein XLithuania X X X XLuxembourg X XMacedonia, Republic of XMalta XMoldova, Republic of X X X XMontenegro, Republic of XNetherlands,The X X XNorway X X X XPoland X XPortugal XRomania X X XRussian Federation X X X XScotland X X X XSerbia, Republic of X XSlovak Republic X X XSlovenia X X X XSpain X Basque XSweden X X X XSwitzerland XUkraine X XNorth AmericaBelizeCanada X X X XEl Salvador X XHonduras X XMexico XTrinidad andTobago XUnited States X X X XTotals 68 40 55 40

Table reflects the most recent test year for which participation information is available.

Source: National Center for Education Statistics and Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development.

1 Webb, R. Benchmarking Definitions. APQC’s Bench-marking Blog, February 3, 2006, http://apqcbenchmarking.blogspot.com/2006_02_01_archive.html.

2 Levy, F., and R. J. Murnane. The New Division of Labor:How Computers Are Creating the Next Job Market.Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2004,pp. 39–44.

3 Ibid, p. 6. The analysis in question could not directlymeasure task changes within jobs, only changesrelated to the shifting mix of jobs, so it actually under-estimated the extent to which skill demands areincreasing across the economy.

4 National Center on Education and the Economy.Tough Choices for Tough Times:The Report of the NewCommission on the Skills of the AmericanWorkforce.Washington, DC: National Center on Education andthe Economy, 2007, p. 19.

5 Friedman,T. L. TheWorld Is Flat. Farrar, Straus & Giroux,NewYork, 2005.

6 Levy, F., and R. J. Murnane. How ComputerizedWorkand Globalization Shape Human Skill Demands. InSuarez-Orozco, M. M. (Ed.), Learning in the Global Era:International Perspectives on Globalization and Educa-tion. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2007.

7 National Governors Association. Innovation America:A Final Report. Washington, DC: National GovernorsAssociation, 2007, p. 2.

8 Wadhwa,V., B. Rissing, G. Gereffi, J. Trumpbour, and P.Engardio. The Globalization of Innovation: Pharmaceuti-cals. Kansas City, MO:The Ewing Marion KauffmanFoundation, June 2008, p. 11.

9 Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. “Innovation IsRapidly Globalizing: India and China Are BecomingCenters of Pharmaceutical R&D Says Kauffman Foun-dation Study,” news release, June 11, 2008, Kansas City,MO.

10 National Academy of Engineering Committee on theOffshoring of Engineering. The Offshoring of Engineer-ing: Facts, Unknowns, and Potential Implications (FreeExecutive Summary). Washington, DC: National Acad-emies Press,Washington, DC, 2008, p. 1.Available at:http://www.nap.edu/catalog/12067.html.

11 Wadhwa,V. Losing Our Lead in Innovative R&D.BusinessWeek, June 10, 2008. Available at:http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/jun2008/tc20080610_151383.htm.

12 Levy, F., and R. J. Murnane. The New Division of Labor,p. 155.

13 In these studies,“high math performance” is defined asa one standard deviation increase in scores on stan-dardized assessments. Hanushek, E.A., and L. Woess-mann. The Role of Cognitive Skills in EconomicDevelopment. Journal of Economic Literature 46, no. 3,

September 2008, pp. 607–68 (p. 617).14 Mortenson,T. Average Family Income by Educational

Attainment of Householder 1967 to 2006. Postsec-ondary Education OPPORTUNITY, no. 185, November2007, pp. 14–16 (p. 15).

15 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Education at a Glance: OECD Indicators 2006.Paris: OCED, 2006, p. 154.

16 Hanushek andWoessmann. The Role of Cognitive Skillsin Economic Development, p. 657.

17 Ibid, 648–50.18 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-

opment. Education at a Glance 2008. Paris: OECD,September 2008, p. 65,Table A2.1.

19 Ibid, p. 87,Table A3.2.20 Ibid, p. 98,Table A4.1.21 Freeman, R. B. Does Globalization of the Scientific/Engi-

neeringWorkforce Threaten U.S. Economic Leadership?Cambridge, MA: National Bureau for EconomicResearch, June 2005, p. 4.

22 Schleicher,A., andV. Stewart. Learning fromWorld-Class Schools. Educational Leadership 66, no. 2, Octo-ber 2008, pp. 44–51 (p. 50, Figure 2: GraduationProjections).

23 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Economic Survey of the United States 2007.Paris: OECD, May 2007, p. 100.

24 Ibid, p. 115.25 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-

opment. PISA 2006 Volume 2: Data. Paris, December2007 (p. 230,Table 6.2c and p. 227,Table 62a). “Best”math students are defined as those performing at the95th percentile of the performance distribution ineach country. “Performed worse” is defined as lowermean achievement based on statistically significant dif-ference at 95 percent confidence level.

26 Eighth-graders scored above average when the aver-age is calculated as the mean score across participat-ing countries. However, a reanalysis by theco-directors of theTIMSS and PIRLS InternationalStudy Center, which oversaw the assessment, revealedthat “using an approach dependent on participatingcountries has caused the international average to shiftwith each assessment.” Based on a scale that is stableover time,American eighth-graders performed “aboutthe same as theTIMSS scale average.” See Mullis, I.V.S., and M. O. Martin (2007). TIMSS in Perspective:Lessons Learned from IEA’s Four Decades of Interna-tional Mathematics Assessments. In Loveless,T. (Ed.),Lessons Learned:What International Assessments Tell UsAbout Math Achievement. Washington, DC: BrookingsInstitution Press, 2007, pp. 9–36.

Endnotes


27 Ginsburg,A., G. Cooke, S. Leinwand, J. Noell, and E.Pollack. Reassessing U.S. International Mathematics Per-formance: New Findings from the 2003 TIMSS and PISA.Washington, DC:American Institutes for Research,November 2005, pp. iv–v.

28 Manzo, K. K. (2007, December 5). America idles oninternational reading test. EducationWeek, 27(14),p. 11.

29 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Problem Solving for Tomorrow’sWorld: FirstMeasures of Cross-Curricular Competencies from PISA2003. Paris, OECD, 2004, p. 144,Table 2.1.

30 Stewart,V. Becoming Citizens of theWorld. Educa-tional Leadership 64, no. 7,April 2007, pp. 8–14.

31 Committee for Economic Development. Education forGlobal Leadership:The Importance of International Stud-ies and Foreign Language Education for U.S. Economicand National Security. Washington, DC: Committeefor Economic Development, 2006, pp. 1–2.

32 National Academy of Sciences Committee to ReviewtheTitleVI and Fulbright-Hays International EducationPrograms. International Education and Foreign Lan-guages: Keys to Securing America’s Future (Free Execu-tive Summary). Washington, DC: National AcademiesPress, 2007, p. 1.

33 Hanushek, E.A., D.T. Jamison, E.A. Jamison, and L.Woessmann. Education and Economic Growth.Education Next 8, no. 2, Spring 2008, pp. 62–70(pp. 68–69).

34 Coulombe, S., and J. F. Tremblay. Literacy and Growth.Topics in Macroeconomics 6, no. 2, 2006: article 4, p. 23.

35 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. PISA 2006 Volume 1: Analysis. Paris: OECD,December 2007, p. 58, Figure 2.11c; and p. 318, Figure6.20b.

36 Schleicher,A., andV. Stewart. Learning fromWorld-Class Schools, p. 47.

37 Ibid, p. 48.38 Roberts, S. In a Generation, Minorities May Be the U.S.

Majority. NewYork Times, April 14, 2008.39 Baldi, S.,Y. Jin, M. Skemer, P. J. Green, and D. Herget.

Highlights from PISA 2006: Performance of U.S. 15-Year-Old Students in Science and Mathematics Literacy in anInternational Context. Washington, DC: U.S. Depart-ment of Education, National Center for EducationStatistics, December 2007, pp. 6, 15.

40 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. PISA 2006 Volume 2: Data. Paris: OECD,December 2007, p. 45,Table 2.6.

41 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. PISA 2006 Volume 1:Analysis. Paris: OECD,December 2007, p. 184, Figure 4.6.

42 Schutz, G., H.W. Ursprung, and L. Woessmann.Education Policy and Equality of Opportunity. KYKLOS61, no. 2, pp. 279-308 (p. 292).

43 TheWorld Bank. Korea as a Knowledge Economy:Evolutionary Process and Lessons Learned (overview ofreport). Washington, DC:World Bank, 2006, p. 1.

44 Kao, J. Innovation Nation: How America Is Losing Its Inno-vation Edge,Why It Matters, andWhatWe Can Do toGet It Back. NewYork: Simon & Shuster, 2007, p. 53.

45 Friedman,T. L. TheWorld Is Flat. NewYork: Farrar,Straus & Giroux, 2005, p. 256.

46 Viadero, D. PISA Results Scoured for Secrets to BetterScience Scores. EducationWeek 27, no. 17, Jan. 9, 2008,p. 10.

47 Personal interview with Andreas Schleicher inWash-ington, DC, June 24, 2008.

48 DeutscheWelle. Germany Moves to All-Day Schools.May 12, 2003. Available at: http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,864144,00.html.

49 Ertl, H. Educational Standards and the ChangingDiscourse on Education: The Reception and Conse-quences of the PISA Study in Germany. Oxford Reviewof Education 32, no. 5, November 2006, pp. 619–634.

50 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. External Evaluation of the Policy Impact ofPISA. Paris: OECD, 2008.

51 Elley,W. B. HowTIMSS-R Contributed to Education inEighteen Developing Countries. Prospects 35, no. 2,June 2005, pp. 199–212 (p. 203).

52 Hegarty, S. F. Statement by Dr. Seamus F. Hegarty, Chair-person, International Association for the Evaluation ofEducational Achievement (IEA):Why PIRLS Is Important.TIMSS & PIRLS International Study Center, BostonCollege, Nov. 28, 2007, p. 2.

53 Ginsburg,A., G. Cooke, S. Leinwand, J. Noell, and E.Pollack. Reassessing U.S. International Mathematics Per-formance: New Findings from the 2003 TIMSS and PISA.Washington, DC:American Institutes for Research,November 2005, p. 8.

54 Telephone interview withVivien Stewart, June 20,2008.

55 DeHann, R. L., and K. M.V. Narayan. Education for Inno-vation: Implications for India, China, and America. Rotter-dam,The Netherlands: Sense Publishers, 2008, p. 3.

56 Mervis, J. Top Ph.D. Feeder Schools Are Now Chi-nese. Science 321, no. 5886, July 2008, p. 185.

57 Commission of the European Communities. ProgressTowards the Lisbon Objectives in Education and Training:Indicators and Benchmarks 2008. Brussels, Belgium:Commission of the European Communities, 2008.

58 Telephone interview with Sir Michael Barber, June 23,2008.


59 Ibid.60 Torney-Purta, J., R. Lehmann, H. Oswald, andW. Schulz.

Citizenship and Education in Twenty-Eight Countries: CivicKnowledge and Engagement at Age Fourteen. Amster-dam,The Netherlands: International Association forthe Evaluation of Educational Achievement, 2001,pp. 7, 15.

61 Zakaria, F. We All Have a Lot to Learn. Newsweek,Jan. 9, 2006. Available at:http://www.newsweek.com/id/47366.

62 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Education at a Glance: OECD Indicators 2006.Paris: OECD, 2008, p. 18.

63 Hull, J. International Assessments and Student Achieve-ment: Archived Chat. Available at: http://www.centerforpubliceducation.org/site/c.kjJXJ5MPIwE/b.2481343/k.F068/Archived_chat_International_assessments_and_student_achievement.htm.

64 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Education at a Glance 2008. Paris: OECD,2008, p. 343,Table C2.1 and p. 345,Table C2.3.

65 Schleicher,A. Benchmarking Internationally:The NeedConfronts Reality. Presentation at the ECS NationalForum on Education Policy in Austin,Texas, July 2,2008 (slide 26). PowerPoint slides available athttp://www.ecs.org/html/meetingsEvents/NF2008/NF2008_resources.asp.

66 National Center for Education Statistics. Variation inthe Relationship Between Nonschool Factors and Stu-dent Achievement on International Assessments. Wash-ington, DC: U.S. Department of Education,April 2006.The United States had a higher than average rate ononly one characteristic studied—the proportion ofstudents in single-parent families.

67 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. PISA 2006 Volume 1: Analysis. Paris: OECD,December 2007, p. 184, Figure 4.6, column 4.

68 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. PISA 2006 Volume 2: Data, Paris: OECD,December 2007, p. 157,Table 4.11. Affluent studentsare defined as those in the top quarter of theirrespective countries on an OECD composite index ofeconomic, social, and cultural status.

69 Ibid, p. 184, Figure 4.6, column 1.70 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-

opment. PISA 2006 Volume 1: Analysis. Paris: OECD,December 2007, p. 184, Figure 4.6, column 3.Theimpact refers to 2006 PISA science scores.Researchers have found that the United States rankshigh on impact of social background onTIMSS scoresas well. See, for example, Schutz, G., H.W. Ursprung,and L. Woessmann. Education Policy and Equality ofOpportunity, p. 292.

71 West, M. R., and L. Woessmann. Which School Sys-tems SortWeaker Students into Smaller Classes?International Evidence. European Journal of PoliticalEconomy 22, no. 4, 2006, pp. 944–68.

72 Akiba, M., G. K. LeTendre, and J. P. Scribner. TeacherQuality, Opportunity Gap, and National Achievementin 46 Countries. Educational Researcher 36, no. 7,October 2007, pp. 369–87.

73 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. PISA 2006 Volume 2: Data. Paris: OECD,December 2007, pp. 191–93,Table 5.17.

74 Ginsburg,A., S. Leinwand,T. Anstrom, E. Pollock, andE.Witt.What the United States Can Learn from Singa-pore’sWorld-Class Mathematics System. Washington,DC:American Institutes for Research, January 2005,p. 8.

75 Schleicher,A. The Economics of Knowledge:Why Educa-tion Is Key for Europe’s Success. Brussels, Belgium:TheLisbon Council, 2006, p. 9.

76 Hegarty, S. F. Statement by Dr. Seamus F. Hegarty, p. 2.77 Stevenson, H., and J. Stigler. The Learning Gap. New

York: Summit Books, 1992.78 National Mathematics Advisory Panel. The Final

Report of the National Mathematics Advisory Panel.Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education,March 2008, p. 31.

79 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. PISA 2006 Volume 2: Data. Paris: OECD,December 2007, p. 114,Table 4.2c.

80 Ginsburg,A., S. Leinwand,T. Anstrom, and E. Pollock.What the United States Can Learn from Singapore’sWorld-Class Mathematics System, p. 8.

81 Välijärvi, J., P. Kupari, P. Linnakylä, P. Reinikainen, S.Sulkunen, J. Törnroos, and I. Arffman. The Finnish Suc-cess in PISA – And Some Reasons Behind It 2. Fin-land: Institute for Educational Research, University ofJyväskylä, 2007.

82 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. PISA 2006 Volume 2: Data. Paris: OECD,December 2007, p. 45,Table 2.6.

83 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Economic Survey of the United States 2007.Paris: OECD, May 2007, pp. 100–101.

84 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Education at a Glance 2008. Paris: OECD,2008, p. 223,Table B1.4.

85 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Education at a Glance 2007. Paris: OECD,September 2007, p. 294,Table C2.4 and p. 72,TableA3.6.


86 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Education at a Glance 2006: OECD BriefingNote for the United States. Paris: OECD, September2006, p. 3.

87 For the most recent overview of such research, seeHanushek, E.A., and L. Woessmann. The Role ofCognitive Skills in Economic Development.

88 Carnevale,A. P. Education and the Economy: IfWe’reSo Dumb,Why AreWe So Rich? EducationWeek 24,no. 21, February 2, 2005, pp. 40-41, 52.

89 Ibid, p. 41.90 Schmidt,W. Comments during panel discussion at the

Hunt Institute and National Governors AssociationGovernors Education Symposium. Cary, North Car-olina, June 9, 2008.

91 Schmidt,W. The Role of Curriculum. American Educa-tor 23, no. 4, Fall 2005. Available at: http://www.aft.org/pubsreports/american_educator/issues/fall2005/schmidt.htm.

92 Schmidt,W. Comments during panel discussion at theHunt Institute and National Governors AssociationGovernors Education Symposium.

93 Schmidt,W., and R.T. Houang. Lack of Focus in theMathematics Curriculum: Symptom or Cause? In Les-sons Learned:What International Tests Tell Us about MathAchievement (T. Loveless, ed.),Washington, DC: Brook-ings Institution Press, 2007, pp. 65–84 (pp. 77–78).

94 Ginsburg,A., S. Leinwand,T.Anstrom, and E. Pollock.What the United States Can Learn from Singapore’sWorld-Class Mathematics System.

95 Schmidt,W., R. Houang, and L. Cogan.A CoherentCurriculum:The Case of Mathematics. American Edu-cator 26, no. 2, Summer 2002, pp. 10–26, 47 (p. 19).

96 Ibid, p. 12. The finding is based on an examination oftextbooks in 37 countries.

97 Ginsburg,A., S. Leinwand,T. Anstrom, and E. Pollock.What the United States Can Learn from Singapore’sWorld-Class Mathematics System, pp. 41–42.

98 Christensen, C. M., and M. B. Horn. How DoWeTransform Our Schools? Education Next 8, no. 3, Sum-mer 2008, pp. 13–19.

99 Wagemaker, H.Highlights of Findings from Major Inter-national Study on Pedagogy and ICT Use in Schools.2006. Available at: http://www.utdanningsdirektoratet.no/upload/Forskning/Internasjonale_undersokelser/sites2006_presentasjon.pdf.

100 Haycock, K. GoodTeaching Matters: HowWell-Quali-fiedTeachers Can Close the Gap. Thinking K-16 3, no.2, 1–14, Summer 1998, p. 3. Based on Sanders,W. L.,and J. C. Rivers. Cumulative and Residual Effects ofTeachers on Future Student Academic Achievement.

Knoxville,TN: University ofTennesseeValue-AddedResearch and Assessment Center, 1996, p. 9,Table 1.

101 Barber, M., and M. Mourshed.How theWorld’s Best-Performing School Systems Come Out on Top. London:McKinsey and Company, September 2007. See alsoWang,A. H.,A. B. Coleman, R. J. Coley, and R. P. Phelps.Preparing Teachers Around theWorld. Educational Test-ing Service, Princeton, NJ, May 2003. That earlierstudy also found that high-performing countries tendto “frontload” quality control, using higher stakes filtersat earlier points in the teacher pipeline than is typicalin the United States. Some countries also used qualitycontrol “backstops” later in the pipeline by requiringrigorous probationary induction periods during whichteachers are not guaranteed permanent posts. Incontrast, the United States used a high-stakes filter atonly one of eight possible points in the teacherpipeline—initial certification.

102 Kao, J. Innovation Nation, p. 85.103 EducationWeek. Quality Counts 2000:Who Should

Teach? Bethesda, MD, 2000. The findings are based onan EducationWeek analysis of data from the federalBaccalaureate and Beyond study.

104 Corcoran, S.,W. N. Evans, and R. Schwab.Women, theLabor Market, and the Declining Relative Quality ofTeachers. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 23,no. 3, 2004, pp. 449–70.

105 Michigan State University. “MSU Study Finds that U.S.Middle SchoolTeachers Are Ill-Prepared,” newsrelease, Dec. 11, 2008, Lansing, MI.


107 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Teachers Matter: Attracting, Developing andRetaining Effective Teachers. Paris: OECD, 2005, p. 202.

108 Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment. Formative Assessment: Improving Learning InSecondary Classrooms. Paris: OECD, 2005, pp. 38-39.

109 E-mail communication from Kati Haycock, November12, 2008.

110 Matthews, P., H. Moorman, and D. Nusche. Building aLeadership Capacity for System Improvement inVic-toria, Australia. In Pont, B., D. Nusche, and D. Hopkins(Eds.), Improving School Leadership,Volume 2: Case Stud-ies on System Leadership. Paris: Organisation for Eco-nomic Co-Operation and Development, 2008, pp.179–213.

111 Barber, M., and M. Mourshed. How theWorld’s Best-Performing School Systems Come Out on Top.


112 Barber, M. Comments during presentation at the HuntInstitute National Governors Association Governors Edu-cation Symposium, Cary, North Carolina, June 8, 2008.

113 Barber, M. Comments during presentation at the HuntInstitute National Governors Association GovernorsEducation Symposium.

114 Barber, M., and M. Mourshed. How theWorld’s Best-Performing School Systems Come Out on Top, p. 16.

115 Ibid, pp. 36–37.116 Archer, J. British Inspectors Bring Instructional Focus

to N.Y.C. EducationWeek. May 16, 2006,Available at:http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2006/05/17/37inspect.h25.html.

117 Achieve, Inc. Creating aWorld-Class Education Systemin Ohio. Washington, DC:Achieve, Inc., 2007, p. 64.

118 Barber, M., and M. Mourshed.How theWorld’s Best-Performing School Systems Come Out on Top, p. 38.

119 Ginsburg,A., S. Leinwand,T. Anstrom, and E. Pollock.What the United States Can Learn from Singapore’sWorld-Class Mathematics System, pp. 34-35.


121 Laukkanen, R. Finnish Strategy for High-Level Educa-tion for All. In Soguel, N. C., and P. Jaccard (Eds.), Gov-ernance and Performance of Education Systems, 2008,pp. 305–24 (p. 318).

122 See, for example,Woessmann, L. International Evi-dence on School Competition,Autonomy, andAccountability:A Review. Peabody Journal of Education82, no. 2–3, June 2007, pp. 473–97; and Fuchs,T., and L.Woessmann. What Accounts for International Differ-ences in Student Performance? A Re-examinationusing the PISA Data. Empirical Economics 32, no. 2–3,2007, pp. 433–64.

123 Woessmann, L., E. Ludemann, G. Schutz, and M. R.West. School Accountability,Autonomy, Choice, and theLevel of Student Achievement: International Evidencefrom PISA 2003. OECD EducationWorking Paper No.13. Paris: Organisation for Economic Co-Operationand Development, Dec. 21, 2007, p. 1.

124 Telephone interview withVivien Stewart, June 20,2008.

125 Stephens, M., and M. Coleman. Comparing PIRLS andPISA with NAEP in Reading, Mathematics, and Science(Working Paper). Washington, DC: U.S. Department ofEducation, National Center for Education Statistics,2007.

126 Hutchison, D., and I. Schagen. Comparisons betweenPISA andTIMSS:AreWe the Man withTwoWatches?In Loveless,T. (Ed.), Lessons Learned:What InternationalAssessments Tell Us about Math Achievement. Washing-ton, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2007, pp. 227–61(p. 238).

127 For more information, visit the Early Assessment Pro-gram (EAP)Web site at http://www.calstate.edu/EAP.

128 Gonzales, P., J. C. Guzmán, L. Partelow, E. Pahlke, L.Jocelyn, D. Kastberg, andT. Williams.Highlights fromthe Trends in International Mathematics and ScienceStudy (TIMSS) 2003 (NCES 2005–005).Washington,DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Centerfor Education Statistics, 2004, pp. 101–3.

129 Akiba, M., G. K. LeTendre, and J. P. Scribner. TeacherQuality, Opportunity Gap, and National Achievementin 46 countries. Educational Researcher 36, no. 7,October 2007, pp. 369–87.

130 West, M. R., and L. Woessmann.Which School Sys-tems SortWeaker Students into Smaller Classes?International Evidence. European Journal of PoliticalEconomy 22, no. 4, 2006, pp. 944–68.

131 Desimone, L. M.,T. Smith, D. Baker, and K. Ueno.Assessing Barriers to the Reform of U.S. MathematicsInstruction from an International Perspective. Ameri-can Educational Research Journal 42, no. 3, Fall 2005,pp. 501–35 (p. 524).

132 Kang, N. H., and M. Hong. Achieving Excellence inTeacherWorkforce and Equity in Learning Opportu-nities in South Korea. Educational Researcher 37, no. 4,May 2008, pp. 200–207.

133 Grubb, N., H. M. Jahr, J. Neumüller, and S. Field. Equity inEducation Thematic Review: Finland Country Note. Paris:Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-opment, 2005, p. 20.

134 Ibid, pp. 19–20.135 Ibid, p. 20.136 Ibid, p. 20.137 Laukkanen, R. Finnish Strategy for High-Level Educa-

tion for All. In Soguel, N. C., and P. Jaccard (Eds.), Gov-ernance and Performance of Education Systems. TheNetherlands: Springer Publishing, 2008, pp. 305–24(p. 312).

138 Field, S., M. Kuczera, and B. Pont. No More Failures:TenSteps to Equity in Education. Paris: Organisation forEconomic Co-Operation and Development, 2007,p. 109.


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