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The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is an initiative of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). It was implemented for the OECD by an international consortium led by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER). ACER also conducted the PISA survey within Australia. PISA is a new survey of the knowledge and skills of 15-year-olds mainly in industrialised countries. The survey seeks to determine: how well students are prepared for future challenges; which skills they have to help them to adapt to change in their lives, e.g. the ability to analyse, reason and communicate their arguments and ideas to others; whether some ways of organising schools and learning within them are more effective than others; if the quality of school resources has an influence on students' learning; and the extent to which student performance is dependent on their home backgrounds and ways to improve learning opportunities for students from disadvantaged backgrounds. PISA assesses the learning domains of reading, mathematical and scientific literacy along with some other areas such as students' familiarity with computers, their learning strategies, and their attitudes towards their schools. The first of a planned three-yearly cycle of assessments was undertaken in 32 countries (28 OECD member countries and four non-member countries that chose to participate) during the year 2000 in randomly selected samples of schools and students. This Australian national report describes PISA and how it developed, the details of Australia's participation, and the Australian results in both the national and international context. It presents insights into the factors affecting the development of students' reading, mathematical and scientific skills at home and at school and discusses the implications of the results for future policy development. Key information from the international report is incorporated in this report to provide Australian readers with a broad perspective of PISA.