Boys Trail Girls in Reading Across States

In contrast, the genders achieve proficiency in math at about the same level.

A new study on gender differences in academic achievement, offering what it calls “good news for girls and bad news for boys,” finds that, overall, male students in every state where data were available lag behind females in reading, based on an analysis of recent state test results. At the same time, in mathematics, a subject in which girls have historically trailed, the percentages of both genders scoring “proficient” or higher were roughly the same, with boys edging out girls slightly in some states and girls posting somewhat stronger scores in others.

In certain states, such as Arkansas, Hawaii, New Mexico, and Vermont, the gender gap for reading proficiency was 10 percentage points or higher, based on 2008 test data, concludes the report , released this month by the Center on Education Policy, a Washington-based research group.

In a conference call with reporters, Jack Jennings, the group’s president and chief executive officer, noted that whether looking at student outcomes at the elementary, middle, or high school level, male rates of proficiency were lower than for females across all states studied in 2008. (Forty-five states had data available...