The latest Programme for International Student Assessment survey, in 2009, showed the UK had slipped to joint 23rd place in a global assessment of literacy, he said.

BBC: Education & Family

Further work is required to do such an assessment, including a survey of how people use the beach, the report added.

BBC: Dalgety Bay radiation: Particles pose 'low risk' to public

Also consider some r ecent health survey and risk assessment results.

FORBES: Paul Krugman's Toxic Shock Syndrome: Mercury Madness

Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa in their great book Academically Adrift have taken data from a respectable indicator of critical thinking and problem solving skills, the Collegiate Learning Assessment, as well as the National Survey of Student Engagement and have concluded, roughly, that typically students neither work very hard nor learn very much.

FORBES: The Three "I's" of Higher Ed Reform

And it makes dismal reading, providing a significantly gloomier assessment of what's happening to the economy than the previous survey published seven weeks ago.

ECONOMIST: Wobbling

Messrs Fuller and Francke waste little time on history, even of the 1980s, and plunge straight into an assessment of the political circumstances and prospects of Shias in the countries they survey.

ECONOMIST: Middle East