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What are the Pisa tests for 15-16 year olds, the Timss tests are for primary school students. 58 countries participated in the global study “Trends in the international study of mathematics and science”, or Timss for short. There were 7000 children in Austria. With the opposite result: in the area of mathematics they obtained 539 points in a comparison at the EU level, while in natural sciences they were only located in the middle with 522 points.
“Good times before the Crown”
The results were collected in the spring of 2019, that is, in the “good old days before the Crown,” Education Minister Heinz Faßmann (ÖVP) said in yesterday’s presentation of Austria’s results. The significantly better math results were “really surprising” for him.
Because in the 72-minute tests, Austrian students improved significantly compared to their last participation in 2011. At that time they only got 508 points. In natural sciences, it dropped significantly compared to 2011 with 532 points.
The comparatively strong mathematics performance of 9-10 year olds is not surprising: even in the PISA study for 15-16 year olds, mathematics is traditionally the best subarea of Austrian students. Only one in fifty Austrian primary school students is considered particularly poor in mathematics. This is the lowest value in the EU. Meanwhile, Austria is among the leaders in terms of primary school students with a migrant background. 28 per cent of pupils in the fourth grade in primary school have family roots abroad, which is the highest figure in the EU.
