Australia’s Public Schools Lag Behind Global Peers, PISA Highlights Classroom Disruption

The 2025 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) results, released by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER), show that 15‑year‑old students in public schools are more than two years behind their independent counterparts. The study, which tests literacy and maths across 91 countries, ranks Australia among the world’s worst in classroom disruption. The report notes that Australian students are two and a half years behind independent peers, a gap that has widened over the past decade. The findings have sparked calls for a ‘digital detox’ in schools, urging a reduction in screen time and a shift toward more traditional learning methods. The data underscore a pressing need for policy review to address the persistent learning deficit.