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Research finds economically disadvantaged student proficiency gap not closing — The Beam #8 | Tennessee Firefly
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The Beam · Issue #8

Research finds economically disadvantaged student proficiency gap not closing

Thursday, July 9, 2026 · Sent to 3,154 subscribers

Research Finds Economically Disadvantaged Student Proficiency Gap Not Closing
Research Finds Economically Disadvantaged Student Proficiency Gap Not Closing

Good afternoon.

This week we took a closer look at what researchers have found in this year's state testing data. A report from Tennessee SCORE found that while proficiency rates are rising, the distance between students from different economic backgrounds isn't shrinking.

The Lead

Research Finds Economically Disadvantaged Student Proficiency Gap Not Closing

By Jacob Holley

Recent state testing results show that these students are improving, but not enough.

Read the full story →

Strong policy and consistent implementation are helping more students reach proficiency. At the same time, proficiency is still too low for too many students, persistent gaps remain, and improved outcomes are not yet reaching every student.

Tennessee SCORE report

By the numbers

23.4ptsGap in ELA proficiency between economically disadvantaged and non-economically disadvantaged students.
25.3ptsGap in math proficiency between economically disadvantaged and non-economically disadvantaged students.
33.3%Economically disadvantaged students in the lowest ELA performance category, twice the rate of their peers.

That's all for today. Be sure and check out the weekly recap of this week's education news on our On the Fly podcast tomorrow afternoon. Find it where you get your podcasts or look for an email in your inbox. Thanks for reading.

The Beam

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