Girls performed better than boys in both grade five and grade seven. Grade five girls performed 21 points better than boys (431 compared to 410); grade seven girls performed 15 points better than boys (489 compared to 474); 39% of grade five girls were at or above the minimum proficiency levels compared to 33% of boys; and 50% of Grade seven girls were at or above these levels compared to 45% of boys.

Students in non-government schools outperformed those in government schools in both grade five and grade seven. In grade five, the mean difference in performance was 126 points between government and non-government schools. In grade seven, the mean difference was 107 points. The variance in performance was higher in government schools. There has been a bigger drop in student performance in government schools compared to non-government schools between 2018 and 2021. Students in grade seven non-government schools performed slightly better from 2018 to 2021, while grade seven students in government schools performed worse between 2018 and 2021 (41 points).

Note the small number of non-government schools in the sample.

The coding of student responses in reading shows that students in Federated States of Micronesia did well in locating information from the text but struggled when asked to identify information when there is competing text in the way. Both grade five and grade seven students struggled when asked to interpret and make inferences from what they had read and when asked to think critically in order to form an opinion or give a reason for a response.