Two OECD reports released in September and October 2026 suggest that sustaining teachers depends on the conditions principals can create. Those conditions are under strain.

PISA, the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment, tests the reading, mathematical and scientific literacy of 15-year-olds across more than 90 countries and economies every three years, and Australia has taken part since 2000. The 2025 results were released this week, and the volume of commentary already in circulation is a reminder that a single results day rarely supports the sweeping conclusions drawn from it in the first 48 hours.

The 2026 NAPLAN national results were released on 5 August (ACARA, 2026). I do not intend to add to the annual commentary about where the scale points moved. Movements of a few points across a national cohort tell an individual school or student very little, and the yearly cycle of that commentary has not advanced the debate in two decades.