For those who are not aware, the TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study) is an international test which provokes many people to get bent out of shape when they see the American results compared to other countries. Politicians and anti-public school groups, as well as sincere reformers, jump on these numbers as proof our schools continue to fail our children.

I ask that, rather than blindly accepting the numbers of TIMSS as an equal comparison, Americans look at the students who are generating the test scores. The first question to ask is not, “Are American scores comparable or better than our fellow nations?” Instead, everyone should be asking, “Are we comparing like populations?”

The sort answer is: no.

The long answer lies below.

The scope of our ignorance, when it comes to what is left out of the the information we are given through the media, is astounding. Rarely do I see the complete picture given when it comes to reporting test results. The work it takes to find the truth goes beyond what most people are willing to invest. I feel the people we are trusting to be the watch dogs of our society (e.g., newspapers and news television) have severely let the American people down by printing only part of the truth, and not examining the details which often tell another story. If you are concerned or interested in this international “high school” comparisons, please follow the link at the end of the quotes below.

There simply is no “high school” or “12th grade” comparison in the TIMSS. What the TIMSS actually compared is “Mathematics and Science Achievement in the Final Year of Secondary School,” which in some countries is equivalent to our junior college students. For example, in the United States the average age of those tested was 18.1 years. In Iceland it was 21.2 years, and the grades they tested were twelfth through fourteenth. Putting the average age of their students tested in parentheses, grade 14 students were in the tested populations of Austria (19.1), Canada (18.6), and Iceland (21.2), while France (18.8), Germany (19.5), Switzerland (19.8), Italy (18.7), and the Czech Republic (17.8), included grade 13 students. In South Africa they only tested twelfth grade students, but their average age was 20.1 (South Africa, along with Denmark, Germany and Slovenia, also did not follow the student sampling guidelines).

There’s more:

Further, if you look at the scores for advanced placement students in Mathematics and Physics, not only do you have the age and grade differences, but the U.S. tested students who were not even in these advance placement classes.

There’s lots more. The article which generated these quotes can found here: The Failing High Schools Hoax.

Notes and References:

1. Staff, “The Failing High Schools Hoax,” AZ Public Schools Making A Difference Every Day campaign, 18 March 2005.