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we have ignored the strongest evidence emerging from the international tests: the adverse effects of poverty and concentrations of poverty in schools on student performance in all countries.

Although countries can exacerbate or mitigate the impact of poverty through their social, fiscal, and education policies, and although some students do overcome the odds, the fact is the gap between high-poverty and more-affluent students remains a fundamental problem in virtually every country.

our rhetoric has assumed that test-score rankings are linked to a country’s economic competitiveness, yet the data for industrialized countries consistently show this assumption to be unwarranted. For example, the World Economic Forum’s 2010-2011 global-competitiveness report ranks the United States fourth, exceeded only by Switzerland, Sweden, and Singapore. Many of the countries that ranked high on test scores rank lower than the United States on competitiveness—for example, South Korea, No. 22, and Finland, No. 7.

Poverty, not international test-score comparisons, is the most critical problem to be addressed by our public policies. Unfortunately, our recent political polarization over budgetary priorities does not leave much room for optimism.