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Not Passing the Test! (Nation’s Report Card 2013)

By Karl Priest 2-10-2014

School board press releases will probably say students are improving and technically that is correct. BUT, improving from “terrible” to “a little less terrible” should not be reason to rejoice.

KIDS COUNT®, a project of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, is a national and state-by-state effort to track the well-being of children in the United States. By providing high-quality data and trend analysis, KIDS COUNT seeks to enrich local, state and national discussions concerning ways to secure better futures for all children — and to raise the visibility of children's issues through a nonpartisan, evidence-based lens.

http://www.aecf.org/MajorInitiatives/KIDSCOUNT.aspx

EARLY READING PROFICIENCY IN THE UNITED STATES
January 2014

(snips and emphasis added)

Today’s children are our nation’s hope for building a strong future economy and thriving society. One of the key milestones on the path to success is learning to read in the early grades. As documented in the Casey Foundation’s reports Early Warning: Why Reading by the End of Third Grade Matters and Early Warning Confirmed , the end of third grade marks the point when children transition from learning to read to using reading to learn other subjects.

This report provides an update on how fourth graders are faring in reading across the nation and in each state. According to the most recent National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) data, 80 percent of low-income fourth graders and 66 percent of all fourth graders are not proficient in reading.

By 2020, the United States is expected to face a shortage of 1.5 million workers with college degrees but will have a surplus of 6 million individuals without a high school diploma who are unemployed because they lack necessary educational credentials.

West Virginia has an alarming 73% of fourth graders that are “Below Proficient” in reading. (proficient = competent= “ having the necessary ability, knowledge, or skill to do something successfully”)

West Virginia was one of only four states whose ranks got worse between 2003 and 2013.

This organization blames poverty for a lot of the problems and wants the government to invest in early childhood education because the first eight years of a child’s life ( “are critical for building the foundation for future learning and emotional development”.

http://www.aecf.org/~/media/Pubs/Initiatives/KIDS%20COUNT/E/EarlyReadingProficiency/EarlyReadingProficiency2014.pdf

2013 EDUCATION DATA BOOK

This report considers reading and math through 2011. The Education Domain Rank places West Virginia at 47 th of the fifty states.

(snips and emphasis added)

Competence in mathematics is essential for success in the workplace, which increasingly requires higher-level technical skills.

Among public school students, math proficiency levels in eighth grade and reading proficiency levels in fourth grade were quite similar in 2011, but there was greater improvement in eighth-grade math achievement. Nationwide, two-thirds (66 percent) of public school eighth graders scored below proficient math levels in 2011, compared with 72 percent in 2005.

http://datacenter.kidscount.org/files/2013KIDSCOUNTDataBook.pdf

More data (by topic and state is found at http://datacenter.kidscount.org/.

2013 data:

Eighth graders below proficient in reading = 75%

Fourth Graders below proficient in math = 65%

Eighth graders below proficient in math = 76%

2009 (the latest provided) data:

Fourth Graders below proficient in science = 72%

Eighth graders below proficient in science = 78%

2007 (the latest provided) data:

Eighth graders below proficient in writing = 78%

2002 (the latest provided) data:

Fourth Graders below proficient in writing = 81%

The Kids Count Data is mostly from the National Assessment of Educational Progress-(NAEP) known as the “Nation’s Report Card”™. The Nation’s Report Card informs the public about the academic achievement of elementary and secondary students in the United States. (http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/subject/publications/main2013/pdf/2014451.pdf)

Here are the 2013 West Virginia results (Note: These are gains!).

Percentage at or above Proficient compared to the nation

*Significantly different [i.e. lower] ( p < .05) from the nation (public).

http://nationsreportcard.gov/reading_math_2013/#/state-performance

 MATH LEVELS
(Numbers in parenthesis are on a scale of 0-500.)

Fourth-grade students performing at the Basic level should show some evidence of understanding the mathematical concepts and procedures in the five NAEP content areas. (214)

Fourth-grade students performing at the Proficient level should consistently apply integrated procedural knowledge and conceptual understanding to problem solving in the five NAEP content areas. (249)

Fourth-grade students performing at the Advanced level should apply integrated procedural knowledge and conceptual understanding to complex and nonroutine real-world problem solving in the five NAEP content areas. (282)

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Eighth-grade students performing at the Basic level should exhibit evidence of conceptual and procedural understanding in the five NAEP content areas. This level of performance signifies an understanding of arithmetic operations—including estimation—on whole numbers, decimals, fractions, and percents. (262)

Eighth-grade students performing at the Proficient level should apply mathematical concepts and procedures consistently to complex problems in the five NAEP content areas. (299)

Eighth-grade students performing at the Advanced level should be able to reach beyond the recognition, identification, and application of mathematical rules in order to generalize and synthesize concepts and principles in the five NAEP content areas. (333)

More details: http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/Mathematics/achieveall.asp

READING LEVELS
(Numbers in parenthesis are on a scale of 0-500.)

Fourth-grade students performing at the Basic level should be able to locate relevant information, make simple inferences, and use their understanding of the text to identify details that support a given interpretation or conclusion. Students should be able to interpret the meaning of a word as it is used in the text. (208)

Fourth-grade students performing at the Proficient level should be able to integrate and interpret texts and apply their understanding of the text to draw conclusions and make evaluations. (238)

Fourth-grade students performing at the Advanced level should be able to make complex inferences and construct and support their inferential understanding of the text. Students should be able to apply their understanding of a text to make and support a judgment. (268)

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Eighth-grade students performing at the Basic level should be able to locate information; identify statements of main idea, theme, or author's purpose; and make simple inferences from texts. They should be able to interpret the meaning of a word as it is used in the text. Students performing at this level should also be able to state judgments and give some support about content and presentation of content. (243)

Eighth-grade students performing at the Proficient level should be able to provide relevant information and summarize main ideas and themes. They should be able to make and support inferences about a text, connect parts of a text, and analyze text features. Students performing at this level should also be able to fully substantiate judgments about content and presentation of content. (281)

Eighth-grade students performing at the Advanced level should be able to make connections within and across texts and to explain causal relations. They should be able to evaluate and justify the strength of supporting evidence and the quality of an author's presentation. Students performing at the Advanced level also should be able to manage the processing demands of analysis and evaluation by stating, explaining, and justifying. (323)

More details: http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/Reading/achieveall.asp

For previous years, see the 2012 report card.

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For lots of information about national testing see Education’s Armageddon.

Also see my articles “Down the Drain ” (2009), “Public School Systems are Neglecting Black Students, ” and “The Public School System is Broken ” (2007). You will need to scroll down to find these articles.

More information about government schools is found at West Virginia News.

For lots of information about national testing see Education’s Armageddon.