New York State’s eighth grade students are scoring at about the national average on a reading exam, but their scores haven’t significantly changed in over a decade.
Results are out this morning for the nation’s reading test, and the numbers show New York State students’ scores have plateaued in the last eight years.
The National Assessment of Educational Progress, commonly known as NAEP, or the nation’s report card, shows that not only have state scores not changed since the test was last administered in 2008, the state hasn’t seen significant growth since the late 1990s.
This year, the average score of a New York State fourth grade student was 224 points and in 2002, that number was 222 points. The picture is similar for eighth grade students: this year their average score was 264, just as it was eight years ago.
The flatlining stands in contrast to the state’s own annual reading exams, which show fourth and eighth grade students making slight gains over the last two years. According to the state’s tests, fourth grade students’ scores increased five scale score points between 2007 and 2009 and eighth graders’ scores grew six points.
Results for New York City won’t be out for some time and a State Education Department official said the agency would release a statement later today.
Source: Anna Phillips