It is widely understood that Australia’s school performance (as measured by international test scores) has been falling. What’s less understood is that this headline buries a stark, unpalatable fact: our international test results show that kids at the bottom of the performance distribution are falling faster and further than kids at the top.

Only one in four domestic undergraduate students were admitted to courses based on their ATAR in 2016, down from one in three in 2014. This is at odds with the message reinforced by schools, families and the media – that the ATAR is everything.

NCEA completion rates have been increasing, with more children than ever earning an NCEA diploma. However, New Zealand’s performance on international benchmarks in numeracy and literacy has been flat or declining.

The recommendations in this report will raise expectations and equity by creating a safety-net of core subjects all students must master. They will reduce teachers’ workloads and the volume of assessment, reduce the opportunities and incentives to teach to the test, and improve teaching and learning.

The Indonesian government hopes to develop a ‘world-class’ education system by 2025. However, numerous assessments of the country’s education performance suggest that it has a long way to go before it will achieve that goal.