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Cover Story

OUT
INDIA OPTS OF PISA 2022

PRUDENCE OR COWARDICE?

With the spectre of PISA 2009 when Indian 15-year-olds were
ranked second last from among 74 participating countries
looming in the background, at the last minute the BJP
government at the Centre withdrew India's participation in PISA
2022, which was written by 690,000 students from 81 countries

Dilip Thakore

T HERE WAS A GROWING SENSE OF in- every three years, has acquired incremental international

evitability about it. At the last minute
popularity.
India withdrew from the transnational
In 2009 shortly after the Congress-led UPA government
was re-elected to power at the Centre, Union HRD (educa-
PISA (Program for International Stu-
tion) minister Kapil Sibal, perhaps enthused by the large
dent Assessment) 2022, results of
which were declared on December 5,
scores in class X and XII school-leaving exams conducted
2023. Organised by the Directorate of
Education and Skills of OECD (Organ- number of students being awarded 95 percent-plus average
by India’s 33 examination boards (including the national
isation for Economic Cooperation & Development), a group CBSE and CISCE), ordered India’s participation in PISA
of developed industrial countries, PISA 2022 tested the ca- 2009. India’s representative batch of 5,000 15-year-olds
pabilities of 15-year-olds representing over 80 countries selected from Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh — re-
around the world in reading, science and maths through a putedly India’s most educationally advanced states — was
common exam. Around 690,000 students from 81 partici- ranked #73, higher than only one country, Kyrgyzstan (pop.
pating countries wrote PISA 2022. The Indian contingent 6 million).
of students was MIA (missing in action). When the results of PISA 2009 were released, the plain
For several years until the millennium year, the Di- truth that our K-12 education system is hopelessly obsolete
rectorate of Education within OECD used to measure the and addicted to rote learning and memorization pedagogies
education progress of countries using the metric of average became manifest. PISA tests the comprehension, critical
years of schooling of 15-year-olds. But this was found to thinking and knowledge application skills of high schoolers.
be unsatisfactory because education standards differed in With egg on its face as media across the country head-
countries. Therefore in the new millennium, the Director- lined the pathetic performance of the India cohort of 5,000
ate devised a common test to measure the reading, maths students in PISA 2009, India skipped PISA 2012 and 2015.
and science attainments of high school children and rank The then UPA government blamed ‘out of context’ ques-
countries according to outcomes. Since then, PISA, held tions for boycotting PISA. However in 2015, the Union gov-

48 EDUCATIONWORLD JANUARY 2024