Arizona’s State Highlights

Summary of Grades

Arizona scores at or below average in three of the four graded categories of education policy in Quality Counts.

The state’s highest grade is for the standards and accountability section, where it receives full credit for having clear and specific standards at each grade span in the four core subjects, as determined by the American Federation of Teachers. But Arizona does not have science and social studies assessments aligned to state standards for elementary, middle, and high school students.

Arizona ranks second-to-last in the nation for its efforts to improve teacher quality. It does not require prospective high school and middle school teachers to major in the subjects they will teach. Only high school teachers are required to pass subject-knowledge tests for a beginning-teacher license. But the state does include information about teacher qualifications on its school report cards.

Arizona has room to improve on school climate measures related to school safety and parent involvement. But the state’s grade in this area receives a boost from strong policies on school choice. The strength of Arizona’s charter school law has received the highestpossible rating from the Center for Education Reform.

Arizona performs poorly on resource equity. For example, the state’s score on the coefficient-of-variation indicator indicates that there is a relatively high degree of disparity in funding levels across the state’s school districts.

Note: Details may not sum to totals due to rounding.