Students write a note to themselves at the beginning of a science proficiency exam tutoring session for seniors inside the classroom of science teacher Sergio Lopez at Chaparral High School in Las Vegas on Monday, April 23, 2012. Seniors have one more chance this school year to pass the proficiency exams, which are mandatory for graduation.
Tuesday, Oct. 25, 2022 | 2 a.m.
Clark County School District students generally performed as well as or better than their peers in other major metros on national math and reading exams despite challenges presented by the pandemic, according to data released today by the U.S. Department of Education.
CCSD students’ performance slid below pre-pandemic levels on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, also known as the Nation’s Report Card, but staying roughly in line with the decline seen nationally in the wake of pandemic interruptions to learning. The math and reading test is typically given to fourth and eighth-graders every other spring, though this year’s was the first since 2019.
The Department of Education separately compared select large urban districts, with CCSD among 26 of the largest school districts in the country, and between states compared to the national average. CCSD is also part of the broader state comparisons.
“With this year’s NAEP data, we see some encouraging results; however, the reality is these numbers serve as a roadmap for the investments we need to make with the remaining COVID funding,” CCSD Superintendent Jesus Jara said in a statement. “These results also show the herculean work of CCSD teachers, administrators, and support professionals in tackling the challenges of the pandemic to minimize the impact on students.”
About half to two-thirds of CCSD children achieved at least “basic” understanding in the two core subjects. Here’s how they did, this year and last time:
4th-grade reading: 54% in 2022; 62% in 2019
4th-grade math: 65% in 2022; 76% in 2019
8th-grade reading: 65% in 2022; 66% in 2019
8th-grade math: 54% in 2022; 59% in 2019
The National Assessment of Educational Progress has its own scale of achievement levels — basic, proficient and advanced — and notes that its “proficient” label is not intended to match the proficiency levels set by state departments of education or to signify being on “grade level.”
Nevada, as a whole, had slightly higher scores with all of its public school districts combined, but among all states still rated “significantly lower” than the national average in fourth-grade math and reading and eighth-grade math, according to the data. Eighth-grade reading was “not significantly different.”
Among urban districts, CCSD was comparable to, or ahead of, 72% to 92% of its peers, depending on the subject and grade.
The urban districts include Albuquerque, N.M.; Atlanta; Austin, Texas; Baltimore City; Boston; Charlotte, N.C.; Chicago; Cleveland; Dallas; Denver; Detroit; District of Columbia; Duval County (Jacksonville), Fla.; Fort Worth, Texas; Guilford County (Greensboro), N.C.; Hillsborough County (Tampa), Fla; Houston; Los Angeles; Jefferson County (Louisville), Ky.; Miami-Dade; Milwaukee; New York City; Philadelphia; San Diego; and Shelby County (Memphis), Tenn.
Performance was notably lower across the country compared to the last pre-pandemic exam, which U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said is a “call to action.”
“The results released today from the National Assessment of Educational Progress are appalling, unacceptable, and a reminder of the impact that this pandemic has had on our learners,” he said in a statement. “This once-in-a-generation virus upended our country in so many ways — and our students cannot be the ones who sacrifice most now or in the long run. We must treat the task of catching our children up in reading and math with the urgency this moment demands.”
CCSD said in a statement that it is investing millions of dollars in federal pandemic relief funds aimed at academic recovery, including free access to online tutoring for all students, free summer school, and master’s degrees and endorsements for teachers in English Language Learning at no cost. The district has also set aside $60 million for a new English language arts curriculum for K-12, which it will purchase once the state department of education approves the materials.
The Nation’s Report Card exams are different from Nevada’s state-administered tests in math and reading, which are given annually to grades 3-8 and 11 of which the results were released in September.
Under the standards set by the Nevada Department of Education’s Smarter Balanced exams, no more than half of CCSD’s elementary and middle school students were considered proficient last school year — a common result statewide – although they did show signs of recovery compared to the year prior, which was spent largely in distance learning.
Last year’s high school juniors, who take the ACT college entrance exam as a graduation requirement, performed slightly worse than juniors did the year before.
Explore the Nation’s Report Card data at www.nationsreportcard.gov.
