Hit the accelerator!

That’s my takeaway from the 2009 NAEP reading results. Here are just a few takeaways from the racial/ethnic subgroup data from 1992 to 2009 for the 4th grade and 1998 to 2009 for the 8th grade:

Black students
– 4th grade: The average scaled score goes from 204 to 216. At or above Basic goes from 47 to 62 percent. At or above Proficient from 10 to 23 percent. Advanced from 1 to 3 percent.
– 8th grade: The average scaled score goes from 248 to 251. At or above Basic goes from 55 to 64 percent. At or above Proficient from 13 to 17 percent. Advanced drops from 2 to 1 percent.

Hispanic students
– 4th grade: The average scaled score goes from 196 to 211. At or above Basic goes from 34 to 56 percent. At or above Proficient from 9 to 20 percent. Advanced from N/A to 3 percent.
– 8th grade: The average scaled score goes from 244 to 250. At or above Basic goes from 51 to 62 percent. At or above Proficient from 12 to 17 percent. Advanced remains at 1 percent.

Asian/Pacific Island students
– 4th grade: The average scaled score goes from 217 to 241. At or above Basic goes from 60 to 85 percent. At or above Proficient from 28 to 56 percent. Advanced from 6 to 22 percent.
– 8th grade: The average scaled score goes from 261 to 281. At or above Basic goes from 72 to 89 percent. At or above Proficient from 35 to 50 percent. Advanced goes from 3 to 10 percent.

The progress among Asian/Pacific Islanders is amazing, and no doubt in part due to getting settled here culturally. The overall picture in MA is quite strong. How does this progress stack up against other states? That deserves a close look.

We see once again that we need more urgency to get poor Black and Hispanic students up to where they need to be, but they are moving in the right direction! Can we please hit the accelerator?

One critical way would be to get our major urban centers to fully adopt the state’s rich academic curricula. There are still many cities that haven’t even aligned their local curricula with the state’s standards. Translation? A lot of urban students are tested on materials they have’t even seen.

That’s not a hard one to fix. Guv? Secretary Reville? Any takers? Does not cost a lot of money!…