Tennessee scores hold mostly steady on Nation's Report Card

Tennessee's scores are holding steady in most areas on the Nation's Report Card, and the state's own assessments are finally better aligned with national standards, state officials say.

According to a new federal report released today, Tennessee's fourth and eighth graders' scores mirrored those nationally in math and reading on the National Assessment of Educational Progress - including in the national drop in math scores for fourth graders.

Only three other states - Oregon, Louisiana and Alaska - saw fourth grade math scores drop from 2015 more than the Volunteer State's, but 10 states nationally saw a decline in math scores.

State officials are pleased with 2017's results, though, citing that the state is still one of the fastest growing in the country.

"We can feel some encouragement and optimism that we are going in the right direction when we compare ourselves to other states, but we know we have a lot of work going forward," said state Education Commissioner Candice McQueen.

McQueen is also confident that results of Tennessee's own state assessment, TNReady, better reflect national assessments, thanks in part to the decade's worth of work put in after Tennessee was accused of having "an honesty gap" in 2007.

"We are in a very exciting moment, though we have a lot to do. We can honestly say we have closed the "honesty gap" between what our state tests now measure and what NAEP measures. This is the first time we can say that," McQueen said. "A decades worth of work has put us in a completely different position because of this alignment, we are more and more confident that the TNReady information we get every year gives us good feedback.

In 2011, four years after the state started rethinking how state scores compared to the nation's, Gov. Bill Haslam also set a lofty goal of becoming the state with the most academic improvements by 2015 and ranking in the top 25 in all content areas.

In 2013, that goal was met, but the state must continue to work toward growth, McQueen emphasized.

NAEP is administered by the National Center for Education Statistics, an independent research arm of the U.S. Department of Education. It is regarded by many experts as one of the best nationwide comparative measures of student achievement.

The exam is administered to a sample of fourth and eighth grade students in all 50 states and a handful of large urban school districts, providing a national comparison of academic success. More than 250,000 students took the reading and math tests in 2017, with about 3,000 of those students in Tennessee.

The assessment remains essentially the same each year so progress and patterns can be more easily traced over time.

Overall, the only area in which scores changed significantly across the country was eighth grade reading, which saw widespread improvement. Fourth grade math scores also dropped across the country, but the change was not considered statistically significant, according to national education officials.

Though changes did not occur across race or socioeconomic status, the achievement gap remains - and officials observed that high-performing students, those in the 75th or 90th percentiles, improved more than others in most areas, and lower students declined.

Last year's tests were also the first to be administered online. Tests were given via tablet to 80 percent of the test-takers, with 20 percent taking the assessments traditionally on paper. Tennessee is one of 10 states that did not previously complete state assessments solely online, which some researchers note could have had an effect on scores.

McQueen did not attribute score fluctuations to the new model of testing, but did not dismiss the potential for impact, either.

"We do think that could have had some impact on our state's scores, but we don't know yet because we don't have that data. If you're being compared to other states who have already made that transition, you do have to make note of that," she said.

TNReady, which begins across the state in a week, will be mostly completed online. State officials have been working to prepare schools and districts for this year's round of testing.

"TNReady is our best state-level view of how our students are doing ... it helps us identify from where we can learn from what is working and where more support is needed," McQueen said.

The commissioner also noted that it is "one data point among many that districts are using to track student achievement."

Georgia scored near Tennessee in most categories, though the state performed better than the national average in eighth grade math. Most scores landed near average. Alabama, which has historically lagged behind, continued to perform well under national scores.

Contact staff writer Meghan Mangrum at mmangrum@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6592. Follow her on Twitter @memangrum.