New NAEP, Same Results: Math Up, Reading Mostly Flat

Gov. Robert Bentley is greeted by students at the W.S. Garrett Elementary School on Nov. 1 in Montgomery, Alabama. Bentley and state education officials visited the school to discuss the National Assessment of Educational Progress.

—Dave Martin/AP

By Erik W. Robelen

New national test data show that 4th and 8th graders have inched up in mathematics, but the results are more mixed in reading, with 4th grade scores flat compared with two years ago.

Overall, achieving proficiency in reading and math on the National Assessment of Educational Progress , known as “the nation’s report card,” remains an elusive goal for the majority of American students. Only about one-third reached that level or higher in reading and 8th grade math, the 2011 data show. At grade 4 math, meanwhile, the figure was slightly higher, at 40 percent.

David P. Driscoll, the chairman of the National Assessment Governing Board , which sets policy for NAEP, said in a statement that the nation has made major gains in math over the past two decades, but that in reading, the growth has been “quite small.” And he called the 4th grade reading scores “deeply disappointing,” noting that they have...