Author: Kevin Dickinson / Source: Big Think
- Finland scored high on the original PISA education assessment, but its scores have slipped in recent years.
- Critics argue that Finland’s success came from earlier education models, not from headline-making features like late start times, lack of homework, and absence of test assessment.
- Asia’s rigorous education system is now eclipsing Finland’s PISA scores. Which approach is the right one? Which is truly shortsighted?
In 2000, the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) released the results of its first survey of education attainment. Administrated by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the triennial assessment tested the skills and knowledge of 15-year-olds around the world.
That year, Finland handily came out as a top performer, scoring high in math and science, and number one in reading. The United States’ performance that same year, for comparison’s sake, could best be described as middling. These results led many to claim that Finland had the best education system in the world. Educators and politicians swarmed to the Nordic country in the hopes of discovering the source of their golden touch.
Then things took a turn, and Finland’s standings began to slip. Between 2006 and 2012, its scores in science, reading, and math fell sharply: 18, 23, and 29 points respectively. PISA 2015 saw further drops; meanwhile, other top performers have remained relatively steady.
“Finland was on a downwards slope, not an upwards one,” writes Tim Oates, director of assessment research and development at Cambridge Assessment. “All the assumptions in 2000 seemed to be of Finland at the top and on the rise, not on the way down. And that was mistaking PISA for a longitudinal study, rather than a cross-sectional one.”
While Finland remains a top performer, it has lost its luster in the eyes of many experts, bringing criticisms of Finland’s education system to the debate.
The real lesson from Finland
(Photo: Andrei Niemimaki/Flickr)
Gabriel Heller Shalgren argues that Finland’s educational successes have their origin with the economic and industrial growth that predates the 2000s.
Finland’s meteoric rise certainly had some cause. Looking in, many claimed it to be reforms dedicated to school autonomy and pupil-led education. They pointed to the system’s lack of centralized accountability and features like late start times, lack of homework, absence of test assessment, and a culture that celebrates the teaching profession.
For Gabriel Heller Shalgren, research director at the Center for the Study of Market Reform Education, this view lacks hard evidence. According to him, Finland’s initial successes resulted from educational standards instituted in the 1970s and ’80s, well before the above policies could take root.
In a monograph titled “Real Finnish Lessons,” he notes that Finland’s teaching system was centralized and teacher-dominated up until the ’90s, meaning decentralized reform came too late for it to be responsible. Instead, Finland’s late developments in industrialization and economic growth bolstered the country’s educational performance. Late developments, Shalgren points out, that mirror those in East Asia.
Shalgren does agree with some popular explanations, such as Finland’s reverence of teachers. However, he notes this is not a recent phenomenon and stems from the role teachers played in the country’s nation-building process, way back in the 19th century.
“Overall, the strongest policy lesson is the danger of throwing out authority in schools, and especially getting rid of knowledge-based, teacher-dominated instruction,” writes Shalgren. “[T]he story from Finland backs up the increasing amount of evidence, which suggests that pupil-led methods, and less structured school environments in general, are harmful for cognitive achievement.”
For Shalgren, the decline in Finland’s recent test scores results from reality finally catching up…
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