Poor PISA score: Govt blames ‘disconnect ‘ with India
Anubhuti Vishnoi, Indian Express online (September 3, 2012)
Indian students participated in Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) for the first time in 2009. 16,000 students from 400 schools across the Indian states of Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu took this test. Though Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu are among the best performing states in India, the PISA scores of their students were dismally low, leading to much discussion in India. The Ministry of Human Resource Development (HRD), however, is arguing that these scores are not a reflection of the country’s schooling but of the disconnect between the test questions and India’s socio-cultural specificities, especially that of rural India. The Ministry will write to the Organization for Economic Cooperation Development to address this disconnect.
