Central Americans and other Latin Americans are feeling more concerned about what Trump can say or do, than over the only thing that can really change the fate of poverty in the region, which is education.
EDITORIAL
The recently published results of the PISA tests confirm that in the best case, these countries maintain positions midway down the table of global results, and in the worst case have fallen in the objective measurement of quality of the most important resource for economic and social development, people and their cognitive abilities.
The quality that the school system has today will determine the quality and development that the economy can achieve tomorrow.
Panama's decision to re-join the group of countries which every three years submit their education systems to the PISA test run by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) will determine any lags that may exist in the model of education in respect to developed countries, and lay the foundation for analyzing the changes that need to be made to increase the capacity of analysis and understanding of students today, for better socio-economic development in the future.
Gaps in GDP per capita between different countries are directly related to the productivity gaps between their respective economies, with education being the main factor in these differences.
The OECD report "Promoting inclusive growth of productivity in Latin America" says that although the region made progress in reducing poverty over the past 20 years, it still stands out at the global level, because of the unequal income its inhabitants.
“In 2006, Finnish students scored the highest average in science and reading among developed countries”.
Finland must be visited by anyone in the education industry, to understand why this country is so successful in all educational levels.
In the past years, Finnish students have systematically placed their country in the first levels of the Science and Reading rankings tests, conducted globally by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Finland also tops the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA).