One PISA round, three culprits: Welt asks about immigration, the PP blames the Ley Celaá, Lisbon's minister blames phones

One dataset, three explanations. The new PISA round reached Berlin, Galicia and Lisbon inside half an hour on 10 September. Three reports, three culprits, and no report tests another country's answer.

Outlet	Cause named	Whose words	How it is given
Welt, Germany	pupils who arrived from abroad	the headline itself; the AfD is the only voice quoted	asserted, then qualified in the body
El Mundo, Spain	the LOMLOE, the Ley Celaá	the People's Party's Prado, with the Socialists' Besteiro answering	attributed to two named politicians, contested
Observador, Portugal	mobile phones	education minister Fernando Alexandre	attributed to the minister

Nobody shows the fall. All 3 reports name a cause. None of the 3 gives a score, a rank or a drop in points. None quotes a teacher, a pupil or the study's authors. Two carry a single voice: a party warning in one, the sitting minister in the other.

The word for the result differs too. Welt calls it a Pisa-Schock. El Mundo calls the Galician result a batacazo, a crash, in its own voice.

Not settled. How far anything fell. No report we hold gives a score, in any subject, for any of the three countries. Nor the German gap in points, the sample behind it, or what the other reasons Welt says exist actually are. On Galicia we hold one report, and it carries an accusation and a rebuttal with evidence for neither. No report tests the cause named in the other two.

What this is about. A new international test of 15-year-olds has come out, and politicians in Germany, Spain and Portugal are arguing over who is to blame for the results.

How it got here. - PISA is the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment. It tests 15-year-olds in reading, maths and science. Rounds have run roughly every three years since 2000. The pandemic pushed the 2021 round back to 2022. - The latest round was sat in 2025, Observador reports, and its results came out in early September 2026. - A bad PISA result has been a national event before. Germany's weak showing in the first round, published in 2001, became known as the Pisa-Schock. That is the phrase Welt uses again now.

Who the actors are. - The OECD runs the test and publishes the results. It has no power over any country's schools. - Germany. Schools are run by the 16 Länder, not by Berlin. The AfD is in opposition, and Welt quotes it on pupils who arrived from abroad. - Spain. Education is shared between Madrid and the regions. The LOMLOE is the 2020 education law passed by Pedro Sánchez's Socialist-led government. It is called the Ley Celaá after the minister who steered it through. The People's Party (PP) opposed it and governs Galicia, where the Xunta is now preparing its own education law, El Mundo reports. - Portugal. The Socialists governed for eight and a half years, Observador reports, with João Costa as education minister in the later years. A PSD-led government took office in 2024 and made Fernando Alexandre education minister. - The European Union has only a supporting role in education. It sets no curriculum, and no EU body is a party to this dispute.

What is at stake. Whichever cause takes hold decides what gets changed. On migration, the debate is about integration policy. On the Ley Celaá, it is about Galicia's new law. On phones, it is about bans. Portugal is extending its school phone ban, Observador reports.

Where it stands. The results are out. The three reports we hold give no scores. Each government and opposition is still arguing over the cause, and none of the reports tests the explanations offered in the other two countries.

The story so far

Earlier stories The AI Times filed on this thread.

What is being argued about

What caused the fall in the new PISA results — and whether any report shows the fall
Who supplies the explanation: a party, a minister, or two politicians set against each other
The German result broken down by pupils' origin, given with no score and no sample
The Galician argument over the LOMLOE and classroom technology, ahead of the Xunta's own education law

The bias in this coverageBias

Three countries, three culprits, no scores

One report points at immigration, one at a school law against digitalisation, one at mobile phones. None of the three carries a score, a rank or the size of the fall it is explaining. The word for the result is a shock in one and a crash in another.

3 reports naming a cause 0 reports giving a score or a point drop 0 reports quoting a teacher or a pupil

Who gets to say why

Two reports hand the explanation to parties, one of them balanced between two named politicians and one carrying a single party warning as its only quote. The third hands it entirely to the minister in office, who also grades his predecessor. No report we hold quotes anyone from outside politics.

2 reports where a party supplies the cause 1 reports where one voice supplies the cause alone 0 reports quoting a voice outside politics

Scored without the mastheads. Where the two passes differ, both are kept.

Sources

Welt

El Mundo

Observador

Claims and verdicts

unverified In the new PISA round, pupils in Germany with a migration background scored markedly worse than pupils without one.

Welt is the only report we hold that carries the German breakdown, and it gives no scores, no gap in points and no sample size. It also says other causes sit behind the overall decline, which the AfD quote it carries does not address.

Checked against 1 source:

Welt

disputed The LOMLOE education law caused Galicia's fall in the latest PISA report.

El Mundo reports the People's Party's Prado blaming the law and the Socialists' Besteiro answering that the impact of classroom technology should be studied first — an assertion and a rebuttal inside one report, with no evidence for either given. We hold no second report on the Galician results.

Checked against 1 source:

El Mundo

unverified Portugal's failure to act on mobile phone use in schools was one of the main causes of its PISA results.

Observador carries this as education minister Fernando Alexandre's own judgement, offered while praising his predecessor João Costa; it is a minister's explanation, not a finding from the study. No other report we hold on Portugal tests it.

Checked against 1 source:

Observador

Who wrote it

R Robert Tannenberg Welt

What the bias passes found in their reporting

Headline against body the body walks back what the headline offers×1

Headline claim the headline ties the result to immigration before any cause is established×1

Headline claim Headline names immigration as the thing to explain before any figure is given×1

Which measure was chosen Gap between two groups stated flat, with no score, no subject and no size×1

Claims we checked that rest on their reporting

1 misleading2 unverified2 true

From 34 reports we hold under this byline, at Welt. Two independent readings, each made without the masthead, a quote attached to every tag. A record, never a rating. Their full record →

S Sabine Menkens Welt

What the bias passes found in their reporting

Headline against body the body walks back what the headline offers×1

Headline claim Headline names immigration as the thing to explain before any figure is given×1

Headline claim the headline ties the result to immigration before any cause is established×1

Which measure was chosen Gap between two groups stated flat, with no score, no subject and no size×1

Claims we checked that rest on their reporting

1 unverified

From 19 reports we hold under this byline, at Welt. Two independent readings, each made without the masthead, a quote attached to every tag. A record, never a rating. Their full record →

J Juan B. Cañellas El Mundo

What the bias passes found in their reporting

Headline claim Headline is a question between two culprits, and names the fall by a colloquial word for a crash×1

Who is named as acting Both parties are named as acting and both causes are attributed to a named person×1

Whose voice is quoted both parties get a cause, in the same sentence, at equal length×1

Word choice the result is a 'batacazo' in the report's own voice×1

Claims we checked that rest on their reporting

1 disputed

From 23 reports we hold under this byline, at El Mundo. Two independent readings, each made without the masthead, a quote attached to every tag. A record, never a rating. Their full record →

M Miguel Pinheiro Correia Observador

What the bias passes found in their reporting

Whose voice is quoted A single voice, the sitting minister, supplies both the cause and the praise for his predecessor×1

Whose voice is quoted only the minister speaks; the culprit he names is phones×1

Claims we checked that rest on their reporting

1 unverified

From 35 reports we hold under this byline, at Observador. Two independent readings, each made without the masthead, a quote attached to every tag. A record, never a rating. Their full record →

The bylines on the reports this story is built from. Hover one for what our passes have measured on their reporting.

Coverage, outlet by outlet

Welt — independent

Was der neue deutsche Pisa-Schock mit der Zuwanderung zu tun hat

The only report we hold that breaks the German result down by pupils' origin — and it gives no score, no gap in points and no sample. Its one quoted voice is the AfD's "Es droht Gefahr"; its body then says other reasons

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Headline claim: Headline names immigration as the thing to explain before any figure is given — “Was der neue deutsche Pisa-Schock mit der Zuwanderung zu tun hat”

Which measure was chosen: Gap between two groups stated flat, with no score, no subject and no size — “Zugewanderte Jugendliche schneiden in der neuen Pisa-Studie deutlich schlechter ab als einheimische.”

Whose voice is quoted: The only direct quote is a party warning; the counter-argument is summarised, not quoted — “„Es droht Gefahr“, warnt die AfD.”

Headline claim: the headline ties the result to immigration before any cause is established — “Was der neue deutsche Pisa-Schock mit der Zuwanderung zu tun hat”

Whose voice is quoted: one party is quoted and no other — “„Es droht Gefahr“, warnt die AfD.”

Headline against body: the body walks back what the headline offers — “Doch hinter dem allgemeinen Negativtrend stecken noch andere Gründe.”

Read it at Welt → https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/plus6aa14338639d45f0a23cf606/bi…

El Mundo — independent

¿Ley Celaá o digitalización? PP y PSOE chocan por las causas del batacazo gallego en el último informe PISA

The only report that gives two named politicians a cause each in one sentence: the People's Party's Prado blames the LOMLOE for the fall, the Socialists' Besteiro demands the impact of classroom technology be studied

PP y PSOE han salido a buscar responsables de los malos resultados cosechados por el alumnado gallego en el último informe PISA. El único problema es que los han encontrado en direcciones completamente opuestas. Mientras los 'populares' apuntan directamente a la LOMLOE -la reforma educativa que el Gobierno de Pedro Sánchez aprobó en 2020 y que rebajó notablemente las exigencias en Secundaria-, los socialistas han puesto el foco en el nuevo modelo híbrido de educación digital que impulsa la Xunta y han encontrado ahí el argumento perfecto para echar balones fuera y cargar contra el Ejecutivo de

Headline claim: Headline is a question between two culprits, and names the fall by a colloquial word for a crash — “¿Ley Celaá o digitalización? PP y PSOE chocan por las causas del batacazo gallego en el último informe PISA”

Who is named as acting: Both parties are named as acting and both causes are attributed to a named person — “Prado culpa a la LOMLOE de la caída y Besteiro exige estudiar primero el impacto de la tecnología antes de que la Xunta saque adelante su nueva ley”

Whose voice is quoted: both parties get a cause, in the same sentence, at equal length — “Prado culpa a la LOMLOE de la caída y Besteiro exige estudiar primero el impacto de la tecnología antes de que la Xunta saque adelante su nueva ley”

Word choice: the result is a 'batacazo' in the report's own voice — “PP y PSOE chocan por las causas del batacazo gallego en el último informe PISA”

Read it at El Mundo → https://www.elmundo.es/galicia/2026/09/10/6aa2895b21efa0227b8b458a.html

Observador — independent

Ministro elogia João Costa e "corrige falhas" do PS

The only report where the explanation comes from a minister in office: Fernando Alexandre names failure to act on mobile phone use as "um dos grandes problemas", in the same breath as praising his predecessor João Costa

O ministro da Educação volta a elogiar a “seriedade” com que o seu antecessor assumiu as responsabilidades do Partido Socialista (PS) sobre os maus resultados no PISA. “O professor João Costa reconheceu a responsabilidade que tinha, isso foi evidente”, disse esta quinta-feira Fernando Alexandre, depois de algumas vozes socialistas terem sugerido que as palavras do antigo ministro teriam sido mal interpretadas. obs_ads.queue_slot({"unit":"web_article_middle","sizes":[[1,1],[300,100],[300,250],[300,600],[500,124],[560,420],[560,480],[560,360],[400,300],[200,200],[250,250],[320,50],[320,100],[300

Whose voice is quoted: A single voice, the sitting minister, supplies both the cause and the praise for his predecessor — “Não atuar sobre utilização dos telemóveis foi um dos grandes problemas, aponta.”

Whose voice is quoted: only the minister speaks; the culprit he names is phones — “Não atuar sobre utilização dos telemóveis foi um dos grandes problemas, aponta.”

Read it at Observador → https://observador.pt/2026/09/10/foi-bastante-serio-rigoroso-fernando-a…

Checked, didn’t cover

D De Telegraaf P Público D De Standaard

Deník N

Brussels Signal

Dagens Nyheter

Digi24

Efimerida ton Syntakton

Der Standard

Telex

Frankfurter Allgemeine

Rzeczpospolita

Magyar Nemzet

Le Figaro

Politico Europe

HotNews.ro

iDNES.cz / MF DNES

NOS

Svenska Dagbladet

Gazeta Wyborcza

Silence is recorded, not inferred — each of these was read when we built this story and carried nothing on this event.

We could not read these

ABC

Corriere della Sera

Kathimerini

Le Soir

Die Presse

Il Giornale

Euractiv

Le Monde

El País

la Repubblica

Süddeutsche Zeitung

These are must-cite outlets for this desk that we did not manage to read when we built this story. That is a gap in our reach, not a silence on their part, and it is not evidence of anything about this story.

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Desks

One PISA round, three culprits: Welt asks about immigration, the PP blames the Ley Celaá, Lisbon's minister blames phones

The story so far

What is being argued about

Three countries, three culprits, no scores

Who gets to say why

Claims and verdicts

Who wrote it

Coverage, outlet by outlet