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65% of Public School 8th Graders Not Proficient in Reading; 67% Not Proficient in Math

Renae

Renae

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(CNSNews.com) - Sixty-five percent of the eighth graders in American public schools in 2017 were not proficient in reading and 67 percent were not proficient in mathematics, according to the results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress test results released by the U.S. Department of Education.The results are far worse for students enrolled in some urban districts.
Among the 27 large urban districts for which the Department of Education published 2017 NAEP test scores, the Detroit public schools had the lowest percentage of students who scored proficient or better in math and the lowest percentage who scored proficient or better in reading.
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https://www.cnsnews.com/news/articl...ders-not-proficient-reading-67-not-proficient

And we're told the answer is more money... ffs people open your eyes the Public ed system is a disaster
 
Sounds really dire. Maybe we should listen to the teachers to get their perspective on the matter!
 
Renae said:
https://www.cnsnews.com/news/articl...ders-not-proficient-reading-67-not-proficient

And we're told the answer is more money... ffs people open your eyes the Public ed system is a disaster
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A complicated history: Americans have always struggled with NAEP.

An even more complicated history: improving standardized test scores for Americans writ large, as well as demographic subgroups, is incredibly, incredibly hard.

Not that you care about that, because you like whining.

Sent from my LG-H910 using Tapatalk
 
OlNate said:
Soo...are you arguing that the answer is more money or not? Unsure of your stance...looks like the results are pretty rough, though...
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I think the issue is the money currently being spent is not spent in the right places that will best impact student learning. We spend more per student than most countries, but if this report is accurate, we aren't getting what we're paying for.
 
Floridafan said:
How bout you remove the large inner city school districts, and we find that suburban and small town schools did very well.
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If you don’t count the parts of our country that scored poorly then we score pretty well.

If you don’t count the parts of our country with high crime then we have low crime.

If you don’t count the parts of our country with high teenage pregnancy rates then our teenage pregnancy rates are pretty low.

Why haven’t we been calculating things like that all along? It makes us seem pretty competitive against other countries. You know, as long as they don’t discount their own under performers as well.

;)
 
Phys251 said:
Sounds really dire. Maybe we should listen to the teachers to get their perspective on the matter!
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Maybe listening to the teachers has caused the problem.
 
Moon said:
I think the issue is the money currently being spent is not spent in the right places that will best impact student learning. We spend more per student than most countries, but if this report is accurate, we aren't getting what we're paying for.
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I agree...it's like weddings, as soon as you say public and school in the same sentence, prices magically increase a few thousand fold. Being a buyer for the school system has always been a lucrative kick back opportunity.

One thing I have always found problematic about the American taxation model is that the money is spent where it is collected, meaning poor communities will get a lot less funding towards their education. In my opinion taxes should be pooled and given out equally, on a per child basis. i.e. , total number of tax dollars / total number of children x number of children at that school. I think that would improve your scores as well.
 
jimbo said:
Maybe listening to the teachers has caused the problem.
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Yes and no, and we also can get into an argument about that "causing" "the" "problem" if "problem" is defined by NAEP score trendlines.

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It might help if we stopped crowding 20-30 children into a single classroom expecting one person to teach them all.
 
Renae said:
https://www.cnsnews.com/news/articl...ders-not-proficient-reading-67-not-proficient

And we're told the answer is more money... ffs people open your eyes the Public ed system is a disaster
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In related news 100% of Reneas deny basic science.

A completely privatized school system would be a disaster and while especially red states like Kentucky chop into school budgets to give massive tax cuts to wealthy individuals and corporations you at there and say “well money ain’t gonna solve it”.

It really goes to show that more extreme conservatives like yourselves who think government is incompetent and can’t get anything right simply elect people to prove it.
 
Moon said:
I think the issue is the money currently being spent is not spent in the right places that will best impact student learning. We spend more per student than most countries, but if this report is accurate, we aren't getting what we're paying for.
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It's accurate enough, but I think what a lot of people would caution you against is overly feeding into the annual "misNAEPery" that happens with a NAEP score release.

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Skeptic Bob said:
If you don’t count the parts of our country that scored poorly then we score pretty well.

If you don’t count the parts of our country with high crime then we have low crime.

If you don’t count the parts of our country with high teenage pregnancy rates then our teenage pregnancy rates are pretty low.



Why haven’t we been calculating things like that all along? It makes us seem pretty competitive against other countries. You know, as long as they don’t discount their own under performers as well.

;)
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My point was that public education works very well in all but big city schools. They have their own set of problems, multiple languages, poverty, crime, lack of parent involvement etc.
Moving kids out of the public school system is definitely not the answer.
 
Renae said:
https://www.cnsnews.com/news/articl...ders-not-proficient-reading-67-not-proficient

And we're told the answer is more money... ffs people open your eyes the Public ed system is a disaster
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Show me a group of 100 kids who are behind in reading and math and I guarantee that 90% (if not more) of them have parents who are addicted to alcohol or drugs, are abusive emotionally, sexually and/or physically, are incredibly passive and don't really care much about their child's education or combinations of all of those. Yes, there are also bad teachers and crappy curricula, but the majority of the problem lies with the family structure and homelives of these children. You can still thrive and succeed in a ****ty education system if you have parents who support, discipline and care about their children's education and future.
 
Fiddytree said:
It's accurate enough, but I think what a lot of people would caution you against is overly feeding into the annual "misNAEPery" that happens with a NAEP score release.

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Sure, I get that. I don't think it's just this score, though. This seems to indicate there's a problem. The severity of that problem is what needs to be researched, preferably in a non-partisan way.
 
Phys251 said:
Sounds really dire. Maybe we should listen to the teachers to get their perspective on the matter!
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I think you're on to something; as long as it's individual teachers we listen to, and not teacher unions and associations. Unions and associations tend to be proponents of loading up the money cannon and firing several salvos at the problem.

Individual teachers, being in the classrooms with the students understand what works and where the problems lay. They can speak to curricula, materials, etc.
 
jimbo said:
Maybe listening to the teachers has caused the problem.
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WOW. While you're at it, maybe you should stop trusting pilots on how to fly airplanes. Or police officers on how to enforce the law. (You probably support Blue Lives Matter, don't you?)

Seriously, take your teacher-bashing elsewhere.
 
Moon said:
Sure, I get that. I don't think it's just this score, though. This seems to indicate there's a problem. The severity of that problem is what needs to be researched, preferably in a non-partisan way.
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Oh, there's plenty of that going on: partisan, bi-partisan, non-partisan, teacher-led, administrator-led, demographic-group advocates, parents...it's been there for decades.

NAEP has been experiencing stagnation for the last 15 years. And in near isolation (even with in-state and sub group demographic breakouts), those scores are really limited in what they are able to tell us. Potentially helpful, yes, but I think the on-the-ground feeling is better at giving some perspective, and then being able to see if any standardized testing is able to reflect some of that.

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Moon said:
We spend more per student than most countries
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The cost of living is much higher in the U.S. than in most countries so this doesn't tell us anything about how we're paying our teachers relative to other professions.
 
Josie said:
Show me a group of 100 kids who are behind in reading and math and I guarantee that 90% (if not more) of them have parents who are addicted to alcohol or drugs, are abusive emotionally, sexually and/or physically, are incredibly passive and don't really care much about their child's education or combinations of all of those. Yes, there are also bad teachers and crappy curricula, but the majority of the problem lies with the family structure and homelives of these children. You can still thrive and succeed in a ****ty education system if you have parents who support, discipline and care about their children's education and future.
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Yeah, but let's throw more money at the problem. Isn't that the answer for fixing everything?
 
Fiddytree said:
Oh, there's plenty of that going on: partisan, bi-partisan, non-partisan, teacher-led, administrator-led, demographic-group advocates, parents...it's been there for decades.

NAEP has been experiencing stagnation for the last 15 years. And in near isolation (even with in-state and sub group demographic breakouts), those scores are really limited in what they are able to tell us. Potentially helpful, yes, but I think the on-the-ground feeling is better at giving some perspective, and then being able to see if any standardized testing is able to reflect some of that.

Sent from my LG-H910 using Tapatalk
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Test scores are improving in every area but urban areas are dragging down their states thus why the scores appear stagnant. I think that tells us a lot.
 
Bullseye said:
as long as it's individual teachers we listen to, and not teacher unions and associations.
[....]
Individual teachers, being in the classrooms with the students understand what works and where the problems lay. They can speak to curricula, materials, etc.
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I Edited your post to respond to two thoughts

Eh....I wouldn't go that far, in either direction. Associations, while having their own agendas and whatnot, are able to devote time to thinking about a problem in-depth.

Individual teachers, while perhaps not so married to an association's agenda (even then, they may very well be), are not able to necessarily see that system-wide perspective (they are, after all "in the trenches"), or even look at it from the lens of different stakeholders. I mean, we can have a teacher perspective that brings out the good points about the importance of family structures and what it's like to actually teach, the limits of their time, but may present that perspective in a way that does a disservice to the plight of families or even the kids themselves.

The most generous answer is the truest one: look at it from multiple perspectives.

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Phys251 said:
WOW. While you're at it, maybe you should stop trusting pilots on how to fly airplanes. Or police officers on how to enforce the law. (You probably support Blue Lives Matter, don't you?)

Seriously, take your teacher-bashing elsewhere.
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Public school teachers deserve every penny and more for the work that they do. They are not paid enough.
 
Moon said:
I think the issue is the money currently being spent is not spent in the right places that will best impact student learning. We spend more per student than most countries, but if this report is accurate, we aren't getting what we're paying for.
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And there's essentially no correlation between cost-per-pupil and student success.
 
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