When the latest Pisa survey was presented in the autumn of 2019, it turned out that 11 percent of the Swedish fifteen-year-olds had been excluded from participating.
The reason given was that the large influx of refugees in 2015 and that the young people had not been in Sweden long enough to reflect how the Swedish school system worked.
The National Agency for Education, the OECD and the Swedish government assured that the selection and calculations were correct.
But last summer prayed yet the Swedish government OECD to check that everything had gone right once again.
The OECD review, which came in the autumn, received harsh criticism in March from the Swedish National Audit Office, which on its own initiative had conducted its own independent review of the Swedish part of the Pisa surveys.
The OECD does not have sufficient knowledge of how new arrivals are received in the Swedish school system to be able to evaluate whether the exclusions were correct, the National Audit Office said in its report.
In addition, it is inappropriate for the OECD to review its own efforts, with the help of information from the National Agency for Education, as these two bodies had already approved the Pisa results and the exclusions made, according to the National Audit Office.
Andreas Schleicher, who is OECD’s The head of education and the person who is ultimately responsible for Pisa and the latest review, now tells DN that he does not regret that the OECD took on the job of reviewing the Pisa results again.
– We are the ones who have the information needed and also access to the experts who know this, he says to DN by phone from the OECD’s head office in Paris.
Reviewing the results once again is something that the OECD routinely does.
– We often get the question from the participating countries who need to make sure that the selection is right, says Andreas Schleicher.
In this case, it was inappropriate for you to examine yourself, according to the Swedish National Audit Office.
– I’m not quite sure why it would be inappropriate. Of course, we could only investigate this by using the information that had already been collected. But we were also very clear that the information is not complete, says Andreas Schleicher.
According to the National Audit Office, the refugee flows were not so extensive that eleven percent could be excluded. At most, the refugees, together with the disabled who were to be excluded according to the rules, could declare an exclusion of a maximum of 6.6 percent.
Schools had also used various reasons to exclude students, which meant that the selection was not comparable between the schools, according to the National Audit Office.
Neither the Swedish government, the National Agency for Education nor the OECD have taken sufficient measures to sort out what may have gone wrong, according to the National Audit Office.
– As I said, I do not know what we could have done differently, says Andreas Schleicher.
The question now is whether we can trust the Swedish Pisa results from 2018, or whether they will be removed. Minister of Education Anna Ekström has told DN that it is the OECD that must answer that question.
– Our calculations and analyzes show that Sweden excluded too many, but we are still very confident that the exclusions will not have a decisive influence on the results, says Andreas Schleicher.
But in the eleven percent there are also those who should have been counted as dropouts and not exclusions?
– I know, but our experts have come to the conclusion that it did not affect the end result, says Andreas Schleicher.
Sofia Sandgren Massih is project manager for the National Audit Office’s review. She does not want to comment on the information on whether the incorrect exclusions affect the final result in Pisa 2018 because the National Audit Office has not investigated that issue.
– But as stated in the report, we think, as I said, that it was inappropriate to let the OECD review the results again. It’s a bit like having a teacher correct the same test again, says Sofia Sandgren Massih.
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