By Alexandria Dennise San Juan
The Philippines scored lowest in reading comprehension out of 79 countries that participated in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) in 2018, the results released on Tuesday showed.
(PIXABAY / MANILA BULLETIN)
The latest PISA results also revealed that the Philippines ranked the second lowest in science and mathematics assessment conducted by the inter-government group Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) last year.
It was the first time that the Philippines took part in the triennial international assessment, which basically aims to test the proficiency in reading, science, and mathematics of 15-year-old learners.
In a forum in Quezon City on Wednesday, DepEd Undersecretary for Curriculum and Instruction Diosdado San Antonio shared that the Philippines scored a total of 353 points in mathematics along with Panama, and 357 in science, which are both below the OECD average of 489 points.
The major domain of assessment of the 2018 PISA is reading literacy which was assessed using two sets of subscale: process (locate information, understand, evaluate, and reflect), and source (single and multiple).
Citing results, San Antonio said Filipino students obtained a mean score of 340 points in the overall reading literacy, which was significantly lower than the OECD average of 487 points.
The Philippine's average performance in the reading assessment was categorized by the OECD to be within Proficiency Level 1a, which means that in general, Filipino students can understand the literal meaning of sentences or short passages, recognize the main theme, and make a single connection between several adjacent pieces of information.
However, majority of the Filipino students, or at least 80 percent, were classified to have a Proficiency Level below Level 2, or those who are unable to identify the main idea in a piece of text of moderate length, and may have difficulty in making comparisons based on single features of text and in making connections between text and outside knowledge.
Only 0.05 percent of Filipino students attained Proficiency Level 5 which means that they are expected to comprehend lengthy texts, and to infer which information in the text is relevant even though the information of interest may be overlooked.
The OECD average was classified as Proficiency Level 3, two levels higher than that of the Philippines.
Among the participating Southeast Asian countries, Singapore ranked the highest in the overall reading, mathematics, and science literacy assessment with 549, 569, and 551 points, respectively, which are all above the OECD average.
The PISA was administered in the Philippines in English pursuant to the PISA 2018 Technical Standards that required participating countries to use their language of instruction as the language of testing.
A total of 7,233 students, mostly in Junior High School, from private and public schools, took the test in four batches from March to April 2018.
The test assumes that the test-takers should have reached a sufficient level of understanding in English to work on the PISA exam without encountering linguistic problems.
Despite the outcome, DepEd secretary Leonor Briones welcomed the 2018 PISA results which she said they will utilize to aid in the department's policy formulation, planning and programming along with their own assessment and studies.
"With the PISA results also reflecting the learners' performance in the National Achievement Test, DepEd recognizes the urgency of addressing issues and gaps in attaining quality of basic education in the Philippines," Briones said during the Wednesday forum.
"In the Philippines, education is our main interest and the most important heritage that we passed on to our learners. We should make quality education accessible to all Filipinos," she added.
According to Briones, the DepEd will lead a program to push for a quality basic education nationwide through its "Sulong EduKalidad" project, which was already launched on Tuesday.
The Education chief said that through the program, aggressive reforms will be implemented in four key areas which include the review and updating of K to 12; improvement of learning facilities; 'upskilling' and 'reskilling' of teachers and school heads through a transformed professional development program; and the engagement of all stakeholders for support and collaboration.
In a separate statement, the Education department called on Filipinos to take "active involvement, cooperation, and collaboration in advancing the quality of basic education in the Philippines. "
"We envision that no Filipino learners should be left behind and it takes a nation to educate a child," it pointed out.