Society

Chinese students excel in reading literacy: OECD

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-12-08 06:56

PARIS - Young Chinese students in Shanghai, a partner city in the education assessment program of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), excelled its members in reading literacy with the highest mean score, according to a report released by the Paris-based organization on Tuesday.

Following a research including two-hour tests of a half million 15-year-old students in more than 70 economies, Shanghai city scored 556, the highest in interviewee economies, while the best performing countries within OECD bloc, South Korea and Finland, respectively marked 539 and 536 points, the report showed.

China's Hongkong ranked the fourth place with 533 scores, ahead of Singapore, Canada, New Zealand and Japan, all strong performers in the tests.

In addition, tests on maths and science also showed outstanding capacity of Shanghai's 15-year olds, among which over one-quarter "demonstrated advanced mathematical thinking skills to solve complex problems, compared to an OECD average of just 3 percent," the organization said.

With an average score of 425, Mexico was on the bottom of the rank in reading literacy, while the OECD average points perched at 494, where the United States, Sweden, Germany, Ireland, France, Denmark and Britain are close to.

The gap of 114 points between the highest and lowest performing OECD countries is equivalent of more than two school years, the OECD indicated.

The latest report of the Program for International Student Assessment "shows that an image of a world divided neatly into rich and well-educated countries and poor and badly-educated countries is now out of date,"the OECD Secretary-General Angle Gurria said.