What does PISA data tell us about education in middle-income countries?

This chapter reviews the evidence regarding the quality and equity of education in middle-income countries, as shown through the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2012 assessment of mathematics. The first section documents the extent of educational quality and inequality in the mathematics performance of students in 18 middle-income countries that participated in PISA 2012, as presented in OECD publications. The second section reviews the empirical evidence for systemic institutional factors (accountability, autonomy competition, tracking and preschool) that are related to higher levels of performance, generally, and as they are related to performance in the 18 countries participating in PISA 2012. It also examines school factors (school inputs, teacher quality, and instructional time) generally related to student performance in low- and middleincome countries and in the 18 middle-income countries participating in PISA 2012. The third section reports the results from new multi-level analyses and other statistical approaches undertaken for this chapter that further explore these topics.