PHILIPPINE education authorities, lawmakers and the public should react with alarm, and not with smugness, to a report that in the 2018 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s (OECD) Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) conducted among 600,000 students in 79 countries, the Philippines ranked lowest in reading comprehension and second to the lowest in both math and science.

Instead of rushing to issue uncomprehending statements on this piece of humble pie, we should all get a clear grasp first of the nature of PISA, and the broad coverage of the survey across all countries and regions.