Yesterday's PISA results showed 15-year-old students in the U.S. lagging behind the top industrialized countries on PISA, a test that emphasizes the practical application* of science knowledge. 

The two extremes in responding are to say (1) the results prove there's a "crisis" in science education or public education or (2) the negative findings don't matter at all. 

I resist the crisis talk because it's really the same crisis identified 24 years ago by A Nation at Risk.  When do the effects of this ongoing education crisis hit?  The motivation for the crisis talk is understandable -- Gov. Romer used the c-word at yesterday's event -- but even today's supposedly miseducated kids can understand the story of the Boy Who Cried Wolf.  Let's figure out a way to respond to these results and improve science education without playing the crisis card.

I also want to push back just as hard against the notion that PISA results should be dismissed.  Some have argued that the tests are unfair to students in the U.S.  Reasons cited include our students' lack of motivation to excel on PISA, the nature of the test questions themselves (different from the way science is taught here), and our nation's diversity.  All these may have some validity, but dismissing the results seems disingenuous at best.

Here's a possible response* that avoids Scylla and Charybdis:

Learn from our own successes.  Identify the areas where U.S. students do well and where we do poorly.  One area where we do well is Earth Science and Space.  Figure out why we are relatively successful in this area and extend some of the same practices to areas where we do poorly.

Learn from others' successes.  Examine and learn from some of the practices of the most successful countries.  Here are two takeways from yesterday's briefing:

Successful countries set a high bar for entry into the teaching profession, and

They do an excellent job of collecting and reporting data on student achievement (though they don't necessarily attach consequences or interventions or sanctions to the data).

Use PISA results as one reality check for measuring the quality of science education in the U.S. However, don't stake everything on PISA.  Consider TIMSS, NAEP and state tests.  Course-taking is important.  And don't forget students' grades in science courses (remember, those subjective grades are often viewed as a better predictor of success in college than are SAT scores).  We should also consider the number of scientists, engineers and mathematicians graduating from our colleges and other appropriate measures.

Don't overlook out-of-school factors. Even the loudest voices for school reform acknowledge that out-of-school factors affect student achievement.  It would be ridiculous to believe otherwise.  The U.S. ranks near the bottom on international rankings of how we treat our children. What do high-achieving countries do outside the classroom that we could emulate?

Invest in science labs and improve hands-on science instruction so students can learn to apply their science knowledge, especially in urban schools. By the way, for those who pooh-pooh class size reduction in the upper grades, think for a minute about about whether class size matters for science labs in middle school and high school. 

Recognize that nation-to-nation comparisons are imperfect.  This goes well beyond the PISA's idiosyncrasies and the role of out-of-school factors or example, PISA seems to a lot of stake in comparing expenditures by translating everything into dollars.  I've spoken with an IMF economist who argues that a better method for some international comparisons is to express them as a percentage of GDP. 

I haven't run these ideas by the smart people at the AFT, so I'm sure I've missed some key ideas, misstated some things, and left holes in my reasoning you could drive a truck through.  But soon the PISA results will have faded from memory and all the public will be left with is a vague impression that students in the U.S. are somehow lagging behind those in other countries.  We could run around like our hair's on fire bemoaning the awful state of our schools, hide our heads in the sand, or use the results to help create rational plan for improving education.  I'm just making my case for option 3.

*Sample PISA questions can be found here.