US Students Retain Middle-of-the-Pack Status

Eighth graders in the US improved in both math and science, according to the recently released 2003 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) rankings, but US fourth graders scored virtually the same as they did in 1995 and lost ground to several other countries. The scores show that US students rank above the international average of nations participating in the testing, but are only in the middle of the rankings among what NSF describes as “those nations that are most advanced or … that have taken part in TIMSS consistently since the study’s first assessment in 1995.”

Students from Singapore outperformed students from all other countries in both math and science at both grade levels. Different numbers of countries participated in different categories in the 2003 study, but overall more than 360 000 students from 46 countries were involved. The TIMSS testing was conducted by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement and was funded by NSF and the Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics. The project began in 1995, and follow-up studies are conducted every four years.

The test results show that minority students in the US, particularly African American and Hispanic students, made significant improvements in math and science at both the fourth- and eighth-grade levels. “We’re pleased to note the improvements by minority students,” said NSF Director Arden Bement. “Having access to quality teaching and challenging material in math and science can only help these students later use their acquired skills to fill opportunities in the workplace,” he said. “Previous TIMSS studies showing declining mathematics performance in middle schools seem to have engendered a response by US school systems, because we now rank among the top three countries in the amount of time devoted to teaching algebra in eighth grade.”

Several of the key rankings in the study are as follows:

• ▸ The mathematics scores of eighth-grade students by country have an “international average” of 466. US eighth graders scored 504 on the math test, placing them 15th on the list of 45 countries.

• ▸ The mathematics scores of fourth-grade students by country have an average of 495. US fourth graders scored 518, placing them 12th on a list of 25 countries.

• ▸ The science scores of eighth-grade students by country have an average of 473. US eighth graders scored 527, placing them 9th on a list of 45 countries.

• ▸ The science scores of fourth-grade students by country have an average of 489. US fourth graders scored 536, placing them 6th on a list of 25 countries.

Within the science category, NSF officials said, US students continued a trend of scoring higher in life, Earth, and environmental sciences than in physics and chemistry. Internationally, at the eighth-grade level, boys tended to do better in physics and Earth sciences, whereas girls generally scored higher in life sciences. Mathematics scores showed little difference between boys and girls. At the fourth-grade level, boys and girls scored about the same in both math and science.

“We should be concerned about US performance in chemistry and physics, which are critical parts of basic science,” said Don Thompson, NSF’s deputy assistant director for education and human resources. “But overall,” he said, “TIMSS bodes well for our education system.”