Positives in national education study includes Georgia

Georgia along with other states is showing improved student achievement in a new national report. But there might be a catch.

The study was put together by the non-profit Center for Education Policy. It analyzed five years of data from state test scores in reading and math.

Jack Jennings is president of the education policy center. He says there’s good news to report from the data since 2002, when the No Child Left Behind Act was signed into law.

"Reading and math achievement on state tests has gone up in most states. And there are larger gains on the elementary and middle levels than there are on the high school levels. And there are larger gains in math than there are in reading".

Those math gains were reflected in Georgia numbers, showing moderate to large increases.

However, that was before the recently toughened curriculum standards in math. The latest state-mandated testing showed nearly 40-percent of 8th graders failed. School officials stand-by the more rigorous standards.

Cox voids some CRCT scores

State superintendent Kathy Cox has decided to throw out the social studies scores of 6th and 7th graders on the CRCT.

Parents and educators were alarmed this week to find that pass rates on that portion of the Criterion-Referenced Competency Tests plunged to unexpected lows.

Only 20-30% of sixth and seventh graders passed the social studies test this year, compared to more than 80% last year. Dana Tofig, spokesperson for the Department of Education, says the state expected lower numbers because it was a new curriculum and a new test, but the dip was more dramatic than expected.

"After we looked at the standard and we looked at the assessment, we came to the conclusion that the scores were not a trustworthy measure of the student achievement in social studies," Tofig said.

Several parents say their children reported that the exam tested topics that they had never covered in class. Tofig says it's more likely that the test delved more deeply into topics they did cover, but without that level of detail.

The Education Department is impaneling a committee to look at the curriculum, the test, and teacher training.

Top state school official has concern over recent test scores

In the wake of poor test results that have come-in for some Georgia students, the state's top school official released a statement Monday to respond. The results are unofficial, but preliminary results for 6th and 7th graders tested on the social studies Criterion Referenced Competency Test show a pass-rate of 20 to 30 percent. For 8th graders tested in math, the unofficial results show that around 40-percent of students failed. State schools Superintendent Kathy Cox says the dip in math results is not unexpected, as standards have been raised. The state will release official results of the CRCT's next month.