A Finnish Lesson for German Students

After PISA, the Program for International Student Assessment, once again awarded Finland top marks in their latest study on Monday, the Nordic country is taking matters into its own hands and helping Europe's educational dunces improve its performance with a new Web site.

Initiated by the Finnish Embassies in Berlin, Vienna and Bern, it demonstrates the efficiency of the Finnish school system with the help of a small, blue troll, who guides visitors through a day in the life of Emilia, a Finnish school girl.

Topping the poll which emphasizes knowledge and skills needed for participation in society rather than mastery of a curriculum, Finland's strong points are excellent pre-school care, literacy skills, overall proficiency and an absence of a gender gap.

Could do better

While Germany has improved slightly in the PISA ranking, the results of the OECD survey published Monday still give the German school system a resounding "could do better" and suggest the country is failing to equip children with the life skills and basic abilities they need.

Crucially, the study also suggests German schools are failing children from disadvantaged and immigrant families and confirms that family income and status play too great a role in educational success.

In a ZDF television interview, Wilfried Steinert, the president of the National Parents' Association, called the situation a disgrace.

"This broad gap that we have in our schools and the fact that kids from middle-class or lower-class families have much less of a chance to lead significant careers is a scandal in educational policy," he said.

Shows improvement

The study, which surveyed a quarter of a million 15-year-olds across 41 countries, does say that German high school students now do better than in the first such survey three years ago. But on the whole they're still way behind their counterparts in top-of-the-class countries like Finland and South Korea.

Students at Germany's college prep schools, known as "Gymnasien," are doing better in the natural sciences than four years ago. But their peers at Germany's other secondary education schools still perform poorly in both areas. It's a finding that has triggered fresh debate on Germany's three-tiered educational model, which disperses children from the age of 10 across its three school systems -- unlike Finland's non-selective, non-grade oriented educational system.

The Polish example

"Considering the general conditions, countries like Germany are not achieving what we would expect them to," said Andreas Schleicher, PISA's international coordinator. He added that he believes only widespread reforms in the German school system will solve the problem.

But other education experts caution that the results of reforms made over the past four years since the last PISA test will take a decade to do any good.

Poland, though, has proved that theory wrong. Polish high school students placed nearly last in reading and comprehension in the 2000 PISA study.

Now, after significant changes in its school system, Poland has passed Germany, with its students ranking above average in reading skills. The PISA study says that at the end of their required schooling, one in five German students can at best do basic grammar school arithmetic and cannot even understand simple reading texts.

By the time the next OECD study is published, educational reforms in Germany might have started to kick in. But Federal Minister for Family Affairs Renate Schmidt isn't overly optimistic.

"In the next five years, Germany may have progressed five places forward," she told broadcaster N24.