All educators can take advantage of the information collected in an international study of reading, mathematical and scientific literacy.

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) compared the reading, mathematical and scientific literacy performance of Australian 15-year-olds with the performance of 15-year-olds in 31 other countries, including the United States, Canada, Japan, Korea and many European nations including the UK and Russia. Some 265 000 students from 32 countries took part in the first PISA survey in 2000 in key areas thought to be essential for full participation in adult life. In Australia, 6200 students from 231 government, Catholic and independent schools in all states and territories took part.

Students answered a two-hour test and a background questionnaire about themselves, and principals answered a questionnaire about their schools. The student questionnaire collected background information on student and their learning environment, learning strategies and computer familiarity.

PISA was implemented for the OECD by a consortium of research organisations led by ACER in Melbourne. The Australian component of PISA was also implemented by ACER and was jointly funded by the Commonwealth, state and territory governments.

The results of the PISA 2000 study were released in December 2001 and there has been considerable international interest in the data from all sectors within the participating countries. The OECD engaged ACER to design and implement an innovative online data dissemination strategy. The data are now available on the internet in formats tailored to different potential users of the data.

Quick glance at the PISA data

This is designed for teachers, principals, researchers and students wanting to explore performance against background variables. The interactive data selection was developed to allow users to quickly determine literacy levels in reading, mathematics and science against one background variable from any country. Data can easily be accessed to investigate background variables such as gender, school location and a number of other student and school variables on the literacy levels in reading, mathematics and science. Data from the interactive website can be readily downloaded onto a local PC to allow for further manipulation and for presentation using desktop packages such as MS Excel.

Copies of the context questionnaires used to collect the background data can be downloaded from the site. When downloaded, these can be used to explore the data. A set of tables is displayed on the screen when questions and countries of interest are selected. The tables will show the percentage in each response category and the mean achievement in each of the three PISA assessment domains (reading, mathematical and scientific literacy).

A considered glance

This is designed for those wishing to explore relationships between variables. More complex analyses, with up to four variables in a range of countries, can also be requested. Results are specific to student performance in reading, mathematical or scientific literacy (only one selection is possible per request). The ACER server does this calculation and when the calculation is complete, the results are emailed back to the user. This service is provided free of charge.

The full dataset

This is suitable for professional statisticians and psychometricians. The PISA dataset contains many stories and will remain a major resource for social scientists in the years to come. To enable professionals to fully explore the data using cutting edge methodologies, the PISA data in its complete form is also available online.

Statisticians and professional researchers can download the PISA 2000 dataset with the full set of responses from individual students and school principals. The files available on this page include the questionnaires, the data files, the codebooks as well as SAS and SPSS control files in order to process the data. Researchers would require the appropriate technology and skills to analyse the data in its full potential.

The PISA report, 15-Up and Counting, Reading, Writing, Reasoning,..How Literate are Australia's Students? Is available on the ACER web site at PISA Reports and in hard copy from ACER Press - contact .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

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