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Hot Takes on NAEP —and What New Jersey Needs To Do
January 29, 2025NEW: Student Reading and Math Scores Stagnate in New Jersey and U.S.
Early this morning the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), also known as “The Nation’s Report Card,” released 2024 test scores for 4th and 8th grade reading and math, both nationally, state-by-state, and for 26 urban school districts. Representative groups of students are tested from all states (12th grade results will be released later this year), with outcomes rated as Basic (partial mastery of the knowledge and skills for future success in that subject), Proficient (solid academic performance), and Advanced (superior academic performance). Scores are divided into percentiles: 90th, 75th, 25th, and 10th.
The results are disheartening despite a giant Covid-triggered federal investment of about $125 billion in K-12 public education that was intended to foster learning recovery. (New Jersey alone got $3 billion.) Yet with the exception of fourth-grade math, student proficiency is lower across the country, increases largely limited to students who were already high-performing, and reading scores were grim. (A few exceptions are Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, and District of Columbia.) According to a press release, “fourth- and eighth-graders are not making the level of progress needed to regain ground lost during the pandemic, although there are some signs of progress.”
In 2024, the percentage of eighth-graders reading below NAEP Basic was the largest in the assessment’s history. The percentage of fourth-graders who scored below NAEP Basic (the bottom category) was the largest in 20 years.
This is not just pandemic learning loss: “NAEP has reported declines in reading achievement consistently since 2019, and the continued declines since the pandemic suggest we’re facing complex challenges that cannot be fully explained by the impact of COVID-19,” said National Center for Education Statistics Associate Commissioner Daniel McGrath.
For a nuanced discussion of trends in U.S. student (and adult) proficiency, see this paper by Nat Malkus, who posits, as others do, that lower levels of achievement started back in 2013, with the pandemic just an exacerbating factor.
In brief, fourth grade math scores improved but eighth grade scores didn’t. In reading, scores dropped in both fourth and eighth grades, perpetuating declines that began before the pandemic. In reading, lower-performing students dropped the most, with those at the 10th and 25th percentiles scoring lower than the first NAEP reading assessment in 1992. Any improvements this testing cycle were driven by students who were already high-performing.
“Overall, student achievement has not returned to pre-pandemic performance,” NCES Commissioner Peggy G. Carr said. “Where there are signs of recovery, they are mostly in math and largely driven by higher-performing students. Lower-performing students are struggling, especially in reading.”
During a press briefing yesterday, Carr said only two states made significant progress: Louisiana in fourth-grade reading and Alabama in fourth-grade math. Other states, she said, are showing “continued stagnation.”
How did New Jersey students do? Here are the results:
Fourth Grade Reading
The average reading score for NJ fourth-graders was 222, six points higher than the national average and one point lower than in 2022 (which is not statistically significant). Thirty-eight percent of NJ students performed above the proficient level, the same as in 2022. Sixty-six percent of NJ students performed better than NAEP’s lowest category, Basic, the same as 2022, which denotes partial mastery of subject matter necessary for future success in math. There was no significant difference between scores in 2019 and scores in 2024.
The average NJ fourth-grade reading score was higher than in 27 other states.
Our achievement gaps are large: “In 2024, students who were identified as economically disadvantaged had an average score that was 35 points lower than that for students who were identified as not economically disadvantaged. This performance gap was not significantly different from that in 2003 (30 points).”
Eighth-Grade Reading
Eighth-grade reading skills fell across the country. The average NJ score was 266, higher than the national average of 257 but four points lower than in 2022. The percentage of students who scored above Proficient was 38%, four points lower than in 2022. Neither drops are statistically significant. Seventy-three percent of students are above the Basic level, slightly below 2022 levels but six points lower than in 2003.
The decrease in proficiency levels between 2019 and 2024 is statistically significant.
NJ average scores were higher than those in 44 other states.
Black students scored 22 points lower than white students and Hispanic students scored 28 points lower than white students. Boys score slightly lower than girls. The achievement gap between low-income and higher-income students is 30 points, the same as 2022.
Fourth-Grade Math
The average score of fourth-graders was 240, not statistically different than the national average of 237 or scores from 2022. Seventy-seven percent of students are above the Basic level. Boys did slightly better than girls. NJ scores were higher than those in 14 other states.
There is a 33 point achievement gap between Black students and white students, two points higher than 2022, and a 28 point achievement gap between Hispanic students and white students. The gap between economically disadvantaged students and non-economically disadvantaged was 32 points.
The drop from 2019 was statistically significant. The only state that showed a statistically significant increase was Alabama.
Eighth-Grade Math
Like on other tests, NJ students demonstrated little improvement from 2022. The average score was 282, ten points higher than the national average but showing little recovery. The percentage of students in New Jersey who performed at or above the NAEP Basic level was 65%. These scores were higher than those in 34 other states.
Compared to 2019, the decrease in student proficiency was statistically significant.
Visit https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/ to view the report.
From 2022: Latest on NAEP Scores: How Does New Jersey Stack Up?
