{"id":282540,"date":"2026-09-09T22:52:50","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T22:52:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/282540\/"},"modified":"2026-09-09T22:52:50","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T22:52:50","slug":"results-from-international-assessment-leads-researchers-to-a-tough-conclusion-pennsylvania-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/282540\/","title":{"rendered":"Results from international assessment leads researchers to a tough conclusion | Pennsylvania News"},"content":{"rendered":"

BETHLEHEM, Pa. – On Tuesday, 38 OECD countries around the world received the data they had been waiting for. The PISA test<\/a> assesses academic performance from 15-year-olds, but it wasn’t good news. In every category; math, reading, and science; the scores were down compared to three years ago. In the U.S. specifically, it said “In reading and mathematics, however, the most recent results are below those observed in 2018, and among the lowest ever observed.”<\/p>\n

Peter Schmidt is a private tutor and President of Prepare Test Preparation in Allentown. He’s even seeing academic problems in kids whose parents pay to get them extra help.<\/p>\n

“If I’m seeing the problems in them, in kids from well-to-do districts, I’m just at the tip of the iceberg,” said Schmidt.<\/p>\n

And the testing numbers back that up. The 2025 PSSA test data<\/a> in Pennsylvania shows Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton’s scores are trending down. Bethlehem even acknowledged the decline in reading scores in a press release<\/a>, saying in part: “When fewer than half of our students demonstrate proficiency on a state assessment, we have to ask hard questions about what the data is telling us.”<\/p>\n

“Part of it is due to COVID, there’s no doubt, but I think we mostly saw some of this coming before COVID,” said Schmidt.<\/p>\n

Schmidt said technology, and artificial intelligence, are causing serious problems for learning.<\/p>\n

“Students are cheating more,” said Schmidt. “If they turn in work that is correct because it’s been copied, then they get a decent grade, they move forward, and nobody is the wiser, but when you take a test, and you don’t actually have any aides, then the test tells you something.”<\/p>\n

But Schmidt said he’s optimistic the trend can be reversed if teaching methods change.<\/p>\n

“We’re going to have to go back to fundamentals. I know it sounds like an old person’s thing to say, but they need to read in class. They need to write in class. They need to do math in class,” said Schmidt.<\/p>\n

Schmidt said he also recommends that parents simply have their kids read more actual books.<\/p>\n

“Reading is kind of really important for your brain. Not just for reading text, but organizing thoughts and being critical in your thinking,” said Schmidt.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BETHLEHEM, Pa. – On Tuesday, 38 OECD countries around the world received the data they had been waiting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":282541,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[214,119,121,120,232,1391,28],"class_list":["post-282540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-_homepage_top_stories","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-news","tag-allentown-area","tag-bethlehem-area","tag-pennsylvania"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=282540"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282540\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/282541"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=282540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=282540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=282540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}