U.S. Eighth-Graders’ Scores Decline on International Assessment of Critical Computer and Information Literacy Skills

WASHINGTON (November 12, 2024) — U.S. eighth-graders scored at the international average for computer and information literacy but below the international average for computational thinking, according to the results of an international study released today of how prepared students are for today’s digital learning and working environments. Scores for U.S. eighth-graders fell in both areas since 2018, the last time the study was conducted.

“While digital literacy is rapidly becoming as fundamental to a well-rounded education as numeracy and basic literacy, many eighth-graders in the U.S. struggle with some key skills, like determining the credibility of news and information that they find online,” said NCES Commissioner Peggy G. Carr. “Basic digital literacy is a prerequisite to communicating, finding employment, and socializing. It is now nearly as fundamental to student success as something like the ‘3 R’s.’”

The International Computer and Information Literacy Study (ICILS) measures eighth-graders’ ability to use computers to investigate, create, participate, and communicate at home, at school, in their future workplace, and in their communities. The 2023 study’s results were released today in the United States by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). This is the second time that U.S. ICILS data have been collected.

“The study raises questions about the technological savvy of students who have been dubbed ‘digital natives,’” Commissioner Carr said. “It might be assumed that this cohort of students, born when the iPhone was launched and raised in a world in which computers and smartphones are commonplace, would navigate an assessment like this one with ease, but these findings show that is not the case for many students. Students now use this technology for hours each day, but many students do not have the basic skills they need to be safe while using it.”

In addition to computer and information literacy, ICILS also measured students’ skills in an optional domain, computational thinking. Twenty-four education systems, including the United States, participated in the optional computational thinking assessment, which measures the type of thinking used when programming a computer and involves conceptualizing problems (through algorithmic or systems thinking) and operationalizing solutions (creating, implementing, and evaluating computer-based solutions to problems). The average U.S. score for computational thinking was lower than the international average.

For computational thinking, the U.S. had a larger percentage of students at Level 1 (27 percent) compared to the international study average (24 percent). Students at the lowest level demonstrated an understanding of patterns and simple sequences, and were able to follow explicit instructions to modify code segments. Students at the highest level (5 percent of U.S. students, not measurably different from the international study average) demonstrated an understanding of a wide range of computational concepts and types of commands, and the ability to decompose complex problems into smaller more manageable components. They were able to iteratively test and refine block–based coding solutions to address real-world problems, resulting in solutions with moderate–to–high levels of both precision and efficiency. The U.S. also had a higher percentage of students scoring below Level 1 in computational thinking (15 percent) compared to the international study average (10 percent).

ICILS also asked students about their experiences using information and communications technologies (ICT) and whether they were learning these skills at school or outside of school. Their answers reveal that a higher percentage of U.S. eighth-graders learned how to conduct internet-related research tasks, such as using the internet to find information and evaluating the reliability of information, from their teachers compared to students in other systems, on average. When it comes to navigating the internet safely, higher percentages of U.S. eighth-graders learned how to manage privacy settings for internet accounts (78 percent compared to 59 percent across all participating education systems) and identify scam messages (73 percent compared to 53 percent across all participating education systems) outside of school rather than at school.

ICILS is sponsored by the IEA (International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement) and is conducted in the United States by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). This was the second time the United States participated in ICILS. Thirty-four countries took part in ICILS 2023: Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium (Flemish), Bosnia and Herzegovina, Chile, Chinese Taipei, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Kazakhstan, Korea, Kosovo, Latvia, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Oman, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, the United States, and Uruguay.

The German state of North Rhine-Westphalia participated as a “benchmark” participant to enable reporting for that entity as well as contributing to the data reported for Germany as a whole. Benchmarking participants are education systems within countries.

Other key findings from the report include:

• The average U.S. score in 2023 was 482, which was not measurably different from the ICILS 2023 study average score of 476.
• The average U.S. score in 2023 (482) was lower compared to the average U.S. score in 2018 (519).
• Students in 16 education systems demonstrated higher average CIL scores than students in the U.S. They were: the Republic of Korea, Czech Republic, Denmark, Chinese Taipei, Belgium (Flemish), Portugal, Latvia, Finland, Austria, Hungary, Sweden, Norway, Germany, Slovak Republic, France, and Spain.
• Ten education systems had lower average CIL scores than the U.S. average. They were: Cyprus, Greece, Uruguay, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Romania, Kazakhstan, Oman, Kosovo, and the Republic of Azerbaijan.
• Six education systems had average CIL scores not measurably different from that of the United States: Luxembourg, Italy, Croatia, North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany), Slovenia, and Malta.
• Only the Republic of Korea (6 percent) had a higher percentage of students performing at the highest CIL proficiency level (Level 4) than the U.S. (3 percent).
• About one-quarter (25 percent) of 8th-grade students in the United States did not reach the lowest CIL proficiency level (Level 1), which was higher than the percentages of students not reaching the lowest proficiency level in 19 education systems.
• U.S. 8th-grade female students’ average CIL score (493) was higher than that of their male counterparts (468) in 2023.

COMPUTATIONAL THINKING (CT)

• The average U.S. score was 461, which was lower than the ICILS 2023 average score of 483.
• The average U.S. score in 2023 (461) was lower compared to the average U.S. score in 2018 (498).
• Average CT scores were higher for students in 14 education systems, or over half of the systems, compared to students in the U.S. Systems with average CT scores higher than that of the U.S. were: Chinese Taipei, the Republic of Korea, Czech Republic, Belgium (Flemish), Denmark, Finland, France, Slovak Republic, Latvia, Sweden, Norway, Portugal, Italy, and Germany.
• Average CT scores were lower for students in four education systems (Malta, Croatia, Serbia, and Uruguay) compared to students in the U.S.
• Four education systems had average CT scores that were not measurably different from the average score for the United States: Austria, Luxembourg, North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany), and Slovenia.

Visit https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/icils/ to view the report.

Statistics from sample-based surveys and assessments are subject to sampling and non-sampling error. All comparisons in this statistical press release have been tested and found to be statistically significant unless otherwise noted. NCES statistical tests are generally conducted at a 95 percent level of confidence.