NCES supports a variety of activities to provide statistical data for cross-national comparisons of education. These activities focus on 2 major areas: indicators and assessments. For the Indicators of National Education Systems (INES) project, the United States, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and other countries collaborate to develop comparable measures of schools and education, from student enrollment and teacher salaries to graduation rates.
The United States also participates in several international assessments, including: the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), both conducted by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA); the OECD’s Program for International Student Assessment (PISA); and the Adult Literacy and Lifeskills Survey (ALL) conducted by Statistics Canada and the OECD.
To learn more about the international studies and projects that NCES supports, click on the links to the left. To return to this page, click on the International Comparisons in Education logo.
To learn more about how these international studies compare with the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), please see A Comparison of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the Third International Mathematics and Science Study Repeat (TIMSS-R), and the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), by David Nohara, and Comparing PIRLS and PISA with NAEP in Reading, Mathematics, and Science 
(211 KB), by Maria Stephens and Mary McLaughlin Coleman.
NCES publishes results from international studies as the data become available. In addition, data from international studies and projects are incorporated into compilation reports, such as the Condition of Education and the G8 Indicator Reports.
News and Highlights
International assessment informational brochure (488KB): Learn about PIAAC, PIRLS, PISA, and TIMSS, how they compare with one another, and which countries participate. (web version)
Now Available:
Teacher Strategies to Help Fourth-Graders Having Difficulty in Reading: An International Perspective (September 2009)
U.S. Performance Across International Assessments of Student Achievement: Special Supplement to The Condition of Education 2009. (August 2009)
Papers presented at the NCES "What We Can Learn From PISA" research conference
(June 2, 2009)
The International Comparability of Socioeconomic Measures in PISA 2006. (AERA Presentation, 2009)
PIRLS 2006 U.S. public-use data files (April 2009)
PISA 2006 U.S. public-use data files (April 2009)
Comparative Indicators of Education in the United States and Other G-8 Countries: 2009 (March 2009)
Data Snapshot
PISA (International) 2006 Assessment
15-year-olds science literacy: 2006
U.S. average score: 489
OECD average score: 500
(Read entire article)
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