2009 PISA Reading Literacy Highlights

PISA measures 15-year-old students every 3 years. The students were tested in 2009, and the next assessment will be in 2012. In 2009, out of the three categories (reading, mathematics, and science), reading was the main focus this time.

PISA tests were administered between September and October of 2009. There were 5,223 participants out of 165 schools in the United States. The test consisted of 2 hour assessments of 15-year-old students. The subjects were given randomly. In the 2009 edition, all students had tests with reading, but not all students had tests with math and science on them.

U.S. 15-year-olds averaged a score of 500 on the combined literacy tests, which was quite competitive.

Among 64 other OECD countries, non-OECD countries, and other education systems, 9 had higher average scores than the United States, 39 had lower average scores, and 16 had average scores not much different from the United States average.

Performance In Reading Literacy

556 Shanghai-China
539 Korea
536 Finland
533 Hong Kong-China
526 Singapore
524 Canada
521 New Zealand
520 Japan
515 Australia
508 Netherlands
506 Belgium
503 Norway
501 Estonia
501 Switzerland
500 Poland
500 Iceland
500 United States
499 Lichtenstein
497 Sweden
497 Germany
496 Ireland
496 France
495 Denmark
495 Chinese Tapei
494 United Kingdom

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