The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2009 results showed for the first time since Slovenia has been participating in international comparative assessment studies that Slovenian students perform below the EU and OECD average. These results have triggered extensive scientific discussions and policy debates, not to mention extensive public and media attraction. As a response, efforts and activities to improve Slovenia’s performance in the next PISA cycles were promptly undertaken. Now, nearly two years after the official announcement of the PISA 2009 results, it is time to synthesize and systematically estimate the responses and activities in the entire Slovenian educational space.

The paper highlights the reception of PISA 2009 results in Slovenia through the theoretical lenses of new modes of governance, policy learning theory and evidence-based policy making. Authors (Ioannidou 2007; Lange and Alexiadou 2007; Wiseman 2010) agree that new modes of governance in the field of education are based on diverse knowledge-based governing tools. Since education is an area that does not require harmonization of national laws and regulations with EU legislation, the main mechanism for translating common agreed EU goals in national contexts is policy learning.

Although the role that international assessment studies plays in national education policies has been frequently addressed, authors agree that empirical evidence in the field is missing. The research question addressed in this paper – “What is the real role of international comparative assessment studies in national education policies and therefore in the European educational space?”– has not yet been satisfactorily answered. The basic objective of the paper is to fill this research gap by providing an innovative research framework for investigating the role of international comparative assessment studies in national education policies with the case study of PISA 2009 in Slovenia. In order to understand the reception of PISA in a national setting, both the institutional context in which the PISA is to be implemented and the micro politics of the PISA (i.e. actor responses and activities as well as relationships between actors) need to be taken into account (Jacobsson and Johanson 2007). Our own analytical model is therefore used, focusing on the questions: Who (are the most influential actors in translating and disseminating PISA results on a national level)? Which (are the instruments and mechanisms these actors use to attract other relevant actors in the Slovenian education space)? And what (is the expected effect of implemented activities)? Overall, the paper systematically explains the strong response to PISA 2009 results in comparison to the lack of attention that accompanied the announcement of above average PISA 2006 results in addition to other international comparative assessment studies in which Slovenia took part (TIMSS, PIRLS, ICCS etc.).

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