Study links economic improvements to test scores

Here is an interesting one for you.

A new study showing a link between one international test score and improvements to a nation’s GDP.

For the United States, the research suggests, modest gains in student achievement as measured by one international assessment could cumulatively boost the country’s gross domestic product by tens of trillions of dollars over the coming decades.

“There’s almost a one-to-one match between what people know and how well economies have grown over time,” Andreas Schleicher, the head of indicators and analysis for the education directorate at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, said at a briefing held here last week to discuss the findings. “It’s not the quantity of schooling that drives success in countries, it is the quality of [learning] outcomes that we see that is explaining the relationship.”

The Paris-based OECD was planning to release the report this week at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

I haven’t read the report – just the news article, but I have a “chicken and egg” question.  Most readers will glimpse this and say “Great – if we as a nation simply focus on raising our test scores on this international assessment – then our economic conditions will improve.”

But what if the economic improvements are actually driving the bus.  What if modest improvements in the economy simply allow families to make different choices?  What if improved economies allow schools to hire more support and better materials and technologies? What if over time these improved economies result in modest improvements to assessment scores?  Like a lot of correlational research – there may be a link but we shouldn’t rush to turning a correlation into a cause and effect judgment.