Wednesday morning’s release of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) test scores show Tennessee students are outperforming their peers across the country in both math and reading.¶
The NAEP test, frequently called the Nation’s Report Card, is given to select fourth and eighth-grade students across the country every two years to measure their math and reading proficiency and Tennessee students outperformed the NAEP national average for proficiency in both subjects for both grades.¶
Researchers with the State Collaborative on Education and Reform (SCORE) found this is the first time that’s happened and the first time Tennessee is listed among the top 25 states on the NAEP. Tennessee students have largely been below the national average in both math and reading going back to 2003, with the exception of 2015, when fourth-graders exceeded the national average in math and eighth-graders exceeded it in reading. Tennessee still ranked below the national average in fourth-grade reading and eighth-grade math that year.¶
This year’s most notable improvements came in math where fourth-graders raised their proficiency by 6 points to 42 percent, top ten in the country. Eighth-graders raised their math proficiency by 7 points to 31 percent.¶
