PISA for Development: reaching out-of-school youth

Across many of the middle- and low-income countries that have participated in PISA or are potential new participants, relatively large proportions of 15-year-olds are not enrolled in school and are therefore not eligible to sit the PISA test. The PISA for Development (PISA-D) project is establishing methods and approaches to include out-of-school youth in the PISA assessment as part of the OECD’s efforts to make the survey more relevant to middle- and low-income countries, and to help develop more inclusive education policies and programmes. In addition to measuring the knowledge, skills and non-cognitive attributes of out-of-school youth, PISA-D is collecting data on barriers to school attendance and on factors that may impede students’ progress through education – important information in support of the Education Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) with its emphasis on leaving no-one behind.