PISA scores linked to teacher status in society

Pupil performance correlates with how society regards and pays its teachers, claims a 35-nation study. China is ranked top and Brazil the lowest, with Germany in midfield.

The Varkey Global Teacher Status Index (GTSI) survey found "a direct link between teacher status and pupil performance as measured by PISA — a set of regular student assessment surveys published by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Development (OECD).
 
The GTSI was derived by charting existing PISA results against answers on teacher standing obtained by a Sussex University-based economic institute from 1,000 adults in each of the 35 countries surveyed as well as 5,500 serving teachers across those nations.

The Varkey-GTSI findings contrast with an internationally cited 2009 meta-study by the New Zealand-Australian education professor John Hattie.

The key to learning, Hattie found, lay in quality teacher-student relations, with emphasis on evidence-based learning, feedback and teacher avoidance of prejudging or fixed mindsets toward individual pupils.

Paid less than considered fair

The GTSI study also found that in 28 of the 35 countries surveyed, teachers were being paid less than what residents considered fair for the job.

Hours worked weekly by teachers were also underestimated in all but six countries, said the study, with Latin Americans working more, notably 13 hours extra in Peru.

Only 22 percent of Germans felt that students respected their teachers, compared to first-placed China where 81 percent of respondents saw teachers respected.

Positive encouragement toward teachers came from 50 percent of parents in China, India, Ghana and Malaysia; less than 8 percent did so in Israel and Russia.