There is a dubious collective folly emerging that high @OECDEduSkills PISA scores are due to explicit teaching, aligned curriculum, and firm behaviour strategies – as in, the, er, recently Conservative England of @NickGibbUK & @michaelgove, for example. But outside of the Asian high performers that require a separate post, there are some inconvenient patterns for this argument. In reading, Ireland is top. It has none of the proclaimed super-strict strategies of England, but it does have a phenomenal record on other metrics of wellbeing. Canada and the US are just 4 points behind at joint 6th. – yet Canada has different autonomous strategies and different political control for each of its 10 provinces. In the US that applies to all 50 states. Go figure! Canada is only 3 points behind the UK in mathematics, and just one point behind in science. This is statistically negligible. Yet Canada, with its tiny private system, and in all but one case, avoidance of educational markets, is as unlike England as you can imagine. As usual, people in different systems are leaping to conclusions to justify their own hobby horses. What we should be more concerned about is two bigger trends. First, the initial PISA promise that testing will raise achievement has failed spectacularly - as evidenced in a relentless decline in results over two decades. Second, global declines affecting almost all countries raise questions not about what is happening in this or that educational system, or with one policy or another. What should be grabbing our attention is what is happening to our young people and their families in a world with mounting inequalities, increased conflict and displacement, rampant technological addiction (among the parents as well as their kids), and the lingering traumas of the biggest pandemic in a century (PISA students were 10 years old when the pandemic hit them!) @JonHaidt The Western world is in a massive state of disrepair. Let’s get a grip on these bigger issues, together, and stop rearranging the nationalistic deckchairs on the global Titanic - and yes, I do have a book coming out about this at the end of the year! @pasi_sahlberg @Miss_Snuffy @teacherhead @LesWalton500 @steve_munby @dizdarm @LucyMPowell @jon_severs @BeatrizPont @VanDammeEDU @schoolsweek