Performance of Hong Kong secondary school pupils falls in global Pisa study on reading and maths competency, with pandemic blamed for general decline

The performance of Hong Kong's secondary school students has declined in a global study assessing reading and mathematical competence. This trend aligns with the experiences of their international counterparts, largely attributed to the pandemic, according to the researchers conducting the study. The Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) discovered that Hong Kong students had slipped from the top 10 to the 11th position in mother tongue literacy. This represents their poorest performance since the inception of the triennial study in 2000. The results were publicly announced on Tuesday afternoon.

However, in a related study surveying 15-year-olds globally, Hong Kong secured the second position in terms of digital learning effectiveness and educational equity. The researchers highlighted the comparable performance of students residing in public housing estates and the affluent Mid-Levels district. Professor Hau Kit-tai attributed the decline in reading scores to the pandemic-induced school closures. Despite a drop in the overall score to 540, down 11 points from 2018, Hong Kong maintained its fourth position out of 81 economies in the Pisa study for mathematics, trailing Singapore, Macau, and Taiwan.

Local students ascended two positions to secure the seventh place internationally for science, scoring 520 points, a slight increase from 517 in 2018. The Education Bureau acknowledged the Pisa study's demonstration of Hong Kong students' consistent performance, with overall scores continually exceeding the international average. They lauded the results despite the challenges posed by the pandemic. Singapore dominated the rankings for all three subjects, with Macau, Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea also featuring in the top 10. The organisation observed a general decline in performance due to the pandemic, with over 30 economies witnessing a drop in maths and reading scores.