How Shanghai topped PISA rankings -- and why it's not big news in China
By Valerie Strauss
Q. How did Shanghai students, participating in a high-profile international exam for the first time, land at the top of the math, reading and science rankings?
A. An obsession with test-taking, to the exclusion of a lot of other things.
Education historian Diane Ravitch, author of the best-selling '"The Death and Life of the Great American School System," and Michigan State University Professor Yong Zhao explain what happened in two separate posts.
At Michigan State, Yong is director of both the Center for Teaching and Technology and the U.S.-China Center for Research on Educational