The twin challenge of equity and excellence in basic skills in the EU : an EU comparative analysis of the PISA 2022 results

This report assesses the results of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2022 in an EU perspective. PISA measures competences in basic skills (mathematics, reading and science) of 15-year-olds across the world. The results show that the share of students who are not able to reach a minimum competence benchmark has largely increased in mathematics and reading, and more moderately in science, in most countries compared to the previous PISA 2018. At the same time, the share of students reaching a high level of competence has declined across the board in mathematics and reading compared to PISA 2018. Socioeconomic background continues to be a strong predictor of student performance. Covid-19 has likely played a role in the performance drop observed between 2018 and 2022, but several countries were already experiencing declining performance trends in one or more PISA domains already before the pandemic. The present situation challenges both the equity and the excellence dimension of the EU education systems and may affect future EU competitiveness. The twin challenge of equity and excellence becomes even more pressing when comparing the EU results with those of other large advanced economies.