Fadhlina: More to Pisa scores than numbers and rankings

 

Amid criticism over the declining performance of Malaysian students in the Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) 2025, Education Minister Fadhlina Sidek urged the public to have a broader perspective.

In a Threads post, she cautioned against focusing solely on scores and rankings, saying education was about more than numbers.

“If we look at Pisa only through the lens of numbers and rankings, we risk missing much of the story about our children," she said.

Fadhlina shared findings from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)’s director for education and skills, Andreas Schleicher, saying she hoped they would help the public look at Pisa “a little differently”.

“Schleicher of the OECD looks at Malaysia’s Pisa 2025 results from a broader perspective - including the strengths of our children, teachers, and schools, as well as the areas that still need improvement,” she said.

Among the findings, 79 percent of Malaysian students demonstrated perseverance in learning, well above the 60 percent average among participating OECD countries.

The assessment also found that a high proportion of Malaysian teachers would continue teaching until their students understood the subject.

Malaysian students also outperformed most participating countries in curiosity, resilience, and their ability to manage their own learning.

Schleicher noted that Malaysian students could solve complex problems, although Malaysia’s 484-point score for computational problem-solving was 16 points below the OECD average.

Critical thinking and parental support

However, he also highlighted several areas requiring improvement.

Parents, for instance, need to play a greater role in their children’s education. Only 34 percent of Malaysian students reported having at least weekly discussions with their parents about problems they might face at school.

Students also need to move beyond memorising mathematical formulas and develop stronger critical-thinking skills. Malaysia’s Mathematics score fell from 409 points in 2022 to 397 in 2025.

Malaysia also recorded a higher proportion of students experiencing cyberbullying than the OECD average of three percent.

Pisa is a programme by the OECD, which is based in France, that assesses the knowledge and skills of 15-year-old students in participating countries and economies.

The 2025 assessment was the largest to date, involving 760,000 students across 91 countries and economies, according to the OECD website. - Mkini