Expectations were not high, but the results were still quite disappointing. The international PISA study, in which fifteen-year-olds from 81 countries are tested on reading skills, mathematics and natural sciences, showed a new low for the Netherlands on Tuesday. It has been known for some time that things are not going well with reading skills in particular, because the PISA scores have been showing a downward trend for twenty years. But the latest measurement shows that the Dutch score in this subject has now even fallen to well below the OECD average.
The fact that the Netherlands is sliding further and further down the international rankings is already a cause for concern, but these figures hide a bigger problem. What PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) investigates is whether students in secondary education are sufficiently prepared to function as independent citizens in the knowledge society. For an increasing number of Dutch students, the answer to that question is ‘no’. When it comes to reading skills, one in three is “insufficiently literate.” For mathematics and science, this applies to one in four students.
Ingrid Thijssen, chairman of the VNO-NCW business organization, calls the Dutch results “astonishing.” “Disastrous,” says Ad Verbrugge, chairman of the Better Education Netherlands Foundation. “Worrying,” says Bas ter Weel, director of SEO Economic Research and professor of economics at the University of Amsterdam. They wonder how these fifteen-year-olds will enter the labor market and participate in society. “This is the human capital that you are building as a country,” says Ter Weel. “This will only increase the division in society,” Verbrugge expects. “This is worrying for the knowledge economy that we want to be,” warns Thijssen.
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There is a point to be made about the low position of the Netherlands in the international PISA rankings, says Ter Weel. “Children who participate are not rewarded. It is not a Cito final test on which your school advice is based. This creates a motivation problem that is worse in some countries than others. And in the Netherlands that could be significant.” That does not alter the fact that there is reason for concern, he says, “because the decline in the Netherlands compared to itself is a real decline.”
Verbrugge remembers that around the turn of the millennium, according to PISA, one in ten fifteen-year-olds was insufficiently literate. “In 2006 that was one in seven. That was one of the reasons why we founded Better Education Netherlands.”
His organization has been providing solutions to improve education for years. For example, Verbrugge believes that universities should become more involved in training teachers and that the level of teacher training courses should be raised. And that ‘proven methods’ of teaching, such as ‘direct instruction’ from the teacher, must be replaced by ‘personalized learning’, where students work at their own pace. He also welcomes the fact that mobile phones are being banned from the classroom.
More digital society
VNO-NCW wants the new cabinet to take charge of the problem that PISA exposes. Thijssen: “It is simply a great shame that we here in the Netherlands, one of the richest countries in the world, are not succeeding in teaching our children to read well, which means that a third will soon be unable to participate properly in society. Moreover, for the first time, proficiency in mathematics has also fallen sharply. These types of basic skills are crucial in an increasingly digital society and because of the increasing importance of technology.”
According to economist Ter Weel, the PISA study makes it clear that investing in education is important. If you don’t do that, it will have consequences for the economy. “If our human capital deteriorates, we can produce less efficiently and then we become less rich as a country. An exact calculation cannot be made, but if you earn 1 percent less per year due to a lower PISA score, then it is worth investing quite a few billions in education.”
There is currently a great need for professionals on the labor market, due to the energy transition. But according to Ter Weel, this need is not structural and the demand for people with a higher professional education or university diploma is still greater, even in the long term. “Routine skills have been taken over by machines and artificial intelligence. We now rely on our problem-solving ability, our creativity, our dealings with people, and our ability to assess situations. You need a good understanding of the world for that. Those lower language scores show that this is deteriorating.”
Verbrugge predicts that segregation between higher and lower educated people will increase further. “It affects the choice of partner. In the pillarized society it was not strange if a girl with little education married a highly educated man. The social layers are becoming increasingly alienated from each other. They no longer meet each other in church.”
Deep breath
Thijssen was annoyed by the statement by Minister Mariëlle Paul (Primary and Secondary Education, VVD) that it will be a “long process” before the problem is solved. “That is unacceptable. Repairs must now be made very quickly for these fifteen-year-olds. Otherwise, they will not be well prepared to start further education in two or three years’ time. We will have to learn more quickly from other countries, for example in Asia, that are rising in the rankings and have shown that you can successfully reverse this trend.”
Ter Weel thinks it will be difficult to catch up. “Yet we should not give up hope. It is difficult to say: we are writing this group off. You cannot do that as a society. In addition, it is economically cheaper to repair now than to have a third of society drop out and receive benefits.”
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