Schoolchildren from BiH showed below-average results in international math and science testing

(Patria) - The achievements of students from BiH are below the international average, according to the results of the international TIMSS 2023 research for Bosnia and Herzegovina.

TIMSS is an international study of trends in mathematics and science knowledge, which provides data on student achievements in these areas, as well as the factors influencing them.

Students from BiH participated in the TIMSS research for the third time. The research was conducted on a sample of 3,391 fourth-grade students from 120 primary schools.

The achieved results are below the international average, announced the Agency for Preschool, Primary and Secondary Education.

Fourth-grade students in BiH achieved 447 points in the mathematics test and 448 points in the science test.

The achievement in both tests positions BiH below the TIMSS scale average of 503 points for mathematics and 494 points for science, and the difference from the average is statistically significant.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, girls achieve better average results in science than boys, and the difference in achievements is statistically significant, while at the international level, girls achieve better average results in science than boys, but the difference is not statistically significant.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, boys achieve better average results in mathematics, but the difference is not statistically significant, while at the international level, boys achieve better average results in mathematics, and the difference is statistically significant.

The TIMSS 2023 results again showed that only one percent of students in BiH, or one in a hundred, achieve results in the advanced benchmark for mathematics, while zero percent of students reach the advanced benchmark for science.

Students from all neighboring countries achieve better results in mathematics - Kosovo 451, North Macedonia 474, Montenegro 477, with students from Albania 512, Slovenia 514, and Serbia 523 being above the TIMSS scale average.

Students from BiH achieve slightly better average results in science than students from the previously listed countries, with the exception of Serbia 510 and Slovenia 526, whose students achieve results above the TIMSS scale average in science as well.

As in previous cycles of TIMSS research, countries in the Far East achieved the best results in mathematics and science. Students from Singapore achieved as many as 615 points in the mathematics test and 607 points in the science test.

The TIMSS 2023 research provides an opportunity for a deeper insight into the achievement levels of our students, as well as the contextual frameworks that influence these achievements – from students' attitudes towards learning, through support from the home environment, to available resources and the quality of the teaching process in schools.

The Agency for Preschool, Primary and Secondary Education of BiH notes that the TIMSS 2023 research was conducted without the participation of RS and ZHK, which is why the results of their students were not recorded in the international trends.

They emphasize that only those competent educational authorities whose students have participated in the last two cycles of TIMSS research will be able to track the trend.

The results and recommendations of the research will, as before, be distributed to all levels of educational authorities in the country in order to take concrete steps to improve the quality of education and accelerate curricular reform.

Only by adapting educational systems to functional knowledge, skills, and competencies, while monitoring student achievement trends at the global level, can children be enabled to keep pace with their peers in other countries and be competent in the labor market.