The Atlanta Public Schools reported on Dec. 7 that improvements in its fourth and eighth grade students’ scores in three out of four categories measured in the National Assessment of Educational Progress tests outpaced those of all other states and school districts.
“APS eighth-grade students gained 17 points on the NAEP reading test results since 2002,” the school system reported. “APS fourth-grade students gained 16 points on the NAEP reading test result for the same period APS eighth-grade students gained 22 points on the NAEP mathematics test results since 2003. APS fourth-grade students gained 12 points on the NAEP mathematics test results for the same period.”
The gains were achieved during the same period that Beverly Hall was the school’s superintendent, a period in which student test scores on the Criterion-Referenced Competency Test were manipulated by teachers to reflect better results, according to a state investigation. Hall retired this year.
APS spokesman Keith Bromery said the scores are trustworthy. He said APS employees did not administer this particular test.
“The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) exams are administered by a contractor for the federal government,” Bromery said. “School district personnel are not involved in any way in administering this test. Additionally, the district turns over to the federal contractor the entire student rosters for the grades tested, and the contractor determines which students are included in the testing groups. Lastly, the results of the NAEP tests for the past decade clearly indicate that cheating was not necessary to achieve escalating student performance for APS fourth and eighth grade students on standardized tests, as the national test is considered more rigorous than its state counterparts.”
APS Superintendent Erroll Davis in a press release said the scores provide valuable information.
“This is the kind of consistent academic performance improvement over time that we value the most, because it affirms the sustainability of this achievement based on the quality and effectiveness of the district’s teachers and the curriculum and instructional programs provided our students on a daily basis,” Davis said. “These results on national standardized tests clearly show that our student performance is real as achieved over a long period of time.”
