It is hard to say whether U.S. students will improve their standings from the TIMSS given in 2003. Four years ago, U.S. fourth graders ranked twelfth in math and sixth in science among the students in 25 countries who took the test. By eighth grade, U.S. students had fallen to fifteenth in math and ninth in science among 45 nations measured.

American students lagged behind such economic competitors as Singapore, Taiwan, China, Korea, and the Netherlands. Although they outperformed some competitors (Italy and Norway), they achieved their middle-of-the-pack position at the expense of Serbia, Lebanon, Tunisia, Ghana, and other developing nations.

To put these numbers into perspective, only seven percent of U.S. eighth graders met the TIMSS benchmark for advanced math and 64 percent for intermediate math. In Singapore, the numbers are 44 percent advanced and 93 percent intermediate.