State of the States

States are putting in place policies to help meet the requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind Act and to improve the conditions in their schools.

By Ronald A. Skinner

Quality Counts 2005 , the ninth annual edition of the report, continues to track state policies and information across key areas of education: student achievement, standards and accountability, efforts to improve teacher quality, school climate, and financial resources. The findings show states are putting in place policies that will help them meet the requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind Act in the areas of teacher quality, testing, and accountability. States also are working to improve the conditions in their schools and to develop stable sources of equitable funding.

Much of the information for the more than 100 state-level indicators included in Quality Counts 2005 comes from the Education Week Research Center’s annual state policy survey . Other indicators were gathered from the National Center for Education Statistics at the U.S. Department of Education and from such organizations as the American Federation of Teachers, the Center for Education Reform, and the Education Commission of the States. All data sources are listed here . A detailed description of how Education Week calculated the states’ grades is also included.

Student Achievement: No new state-level data are available from the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Quality Counts 2004 included the 2003 state NAEP results in reading and mathematics, and presented those statistics disaggregated by...