SINGAPORE - Students from lower-income homes here not only do better than their overseas peers from poor families but also outperform the average international student. This was among the findings of the latest Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) study.
The results of the study, carried out by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 2022, were released on Dec 5.
Singapore students from what was labelled as the bottom 25 per cent of socio-economic status (SES) homes performed better than the OECD average for all three domains of reading, mathematics and science that featured in the survey.
They scored 484 in reading versus an overall OECD average of 476. In mathematics and science, they achieved scores of 515 and 504, compared with the OECD averages of 472 and 485, respectively.
The study found that 43 per cent of Singapore’s lower-SES students – slightly lower than 47 per cent in 2018 – were “core-skills resilient”, which means they attained at least proficiency level three in all domains of reading, mathematics and science. In Pisa, level one is the lowest proficiency level, and six the highest.
Singapore had the second-highest proportion of such students among participating education systems in Pisa 2022. The OECD average was 19 per cent.
Still, individual country reports published by OECD showed that the score gap in mathematics between the top and bottom SES quarters of students in Singapore was 112, larger than the average difference of 93 across OECD countries.
But about 10 per cent of disadvantaged Singapore students could score in the top quarter in mathematics within the Republic, similar to the OECD average. The report said these students are considered “academically resilient” as despite their socio-economic disadvantage, they achieved top marks in comparison with peers in their own countries.
The Ministry of Education said that notwithstanding the results, it will continue to provide additional support for students from lower-SES homes through efforts like Uplift. The Uplifting Pupils in Life and Inspiring Families Taskforce (Uplift) was set up in 2018 to support disadvantaged students and tackle long-term absenteeism, among other challenges.
Overall, Singapore’s 15-year- olds came out tops across all three categories – mathematics, science and reading – in Pisa 2022, which measured how well students use their knowledge and skills to solve real-world problems.
A representative sample of 6,606 students from 149 secondary schools and 15 private schools, including international schools and madrasahs, took part in the study from April to May 2022.
