The Trade-Off between Excellence and Equality: What International Assessments Tell Us

This paper uses PISA data to explore cross-national comparisons of mathematics performance and educational inequality, with a focus on those countries that are characterized by high PISA scores and greater equity. The authors discuss the dangers of giving too much attention to a single year’s high performer on a given international assessment. Instead, they argue that the PISA and TIMSS should be analyzed with a more nuanced set of indicators and with greater sensitivity to long-term trends. This approach can help generate new research hypotheses, identify groups of countries worthy of detailed study, and yield fresh insights on educational policy.