Research Information System
7th European Conference on Information Literacy (ECIL), ELECTR NETWORK, 20 - 23 September 2021, pp.364-376, (Full Text)
Consistent performance by Estonian students ranking among the world's best and, most recently, in first position among European countries in all three PISA assessment domains has sparked widespread interest as to the reasons for this. We review the literature especially with respect to science literacy and compare those findings to the reasons that twelve expert Estonian science educators offer. These educators' views largely match the explanations in the literature, but the experts suggested an important factor is the extensive instructional support systems and the strong value that teachers, students, and Estonian society generally have traditionally put on education. While Estonia's PISA ranking is impressive, the country's continuing integration into Europe with the values and attitudes common to other OECD countries may dilute the attributes that have propelled Estonia's education system and its students to this lofty status on the PISA.