UK pupils rank highly again in international reading, maths and science tests

UK pupils have performed well again in international science, reading and maths tests sat every three years by hundreds of thousands of teenagers around the world. The UK's performance in the Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) remained steady, ranking below the highest-performing countries like Singapore, Estonia and parts of China, but ahead of the US, Australia and other major European nations. But the Pisa report also warned of a worldwide decline in teenagers' reading skills. England's schools minister, Georgia Gould, said the government wanted to build on the positive results and go further so all young people leave school with strong literacy and numeracy. The Pisa tests, run by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), assess teenagers on their ability to solve problems, think critically and communicate, before asking them a wider range of questions about their education in a questionnaire.