Urban Students Outpacing Nation On NAEP Math Scores

The latest release of data from the NAEP has generated massive coverage today, mostly focused on gains made by urban students on the math portion of the test, or on the results in given cities or states. Most coverage touted the gains, while other reports focused on lingering gaps between urban students and their peers. Several national articles single out Atlanta, which was embroiled in a recent cheating scandal. The Christian Science Monitor (12/8, Paulson) reports, "Students in America's largest cities are making gains in math, in many cases faster than students in the nation as a whole." However, all students reading scores have remained stagnant. Meanwhile, "in some cities – including Atlanta, Boston, Los Angeles, and Houston – students have made particularly striking gains over the past eight years, while in other cities progress has lagged." Wednesday's report "provided detailed scores for students in 21 large cities – a voluntary subset that participates in NAEP's Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA)."

The Education Week (12/8, Robelen) adds, "In math, four out of 18 big-city districts posted statistically significant 4th grade gains from 2009 to 2011, while six out of 18 made progress at 8th grade." Moreover, "Atlanta was the only district to make math gains at both grade levels since 2009. In reading, meanwhile, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg, N.C., school district was the only participant to see reading gains of statistical significance since 2009, and those were only at the 8th grade level." The article suggests that viewed within the historical context, the results are "hopeful" because most TUDA districts "since the early 2000s have made gains in both subjects."

The AP (12/8, Turner) reports that "Federal officials said there was no evidence that the [Atlanta] cheating had carried over to the" NAEP, "and that Atlanta fourth- and eighth-graders have made substantial gains since 2002." Meanwhile, "Federal officials warned against comparing the urban districts that participated in the national test because they vary widely in student makeup, teacher experience and culture. Still, the urban districts' results mirror results released in a national report last month -- students made progress in math but their reading scores have mostly remained stagnant in the last two years."