Mixed bag for Utah pupils

Several Utah education officials and community advocates had not had a chance to closely examine the state's showing Wednesday afternoon. But it continued a trend that has been pronounced for years.

"It would not surprise me if our achievement gap is as large or larger than the national average, because we have not been attending to it very well on the state level," said McKell Withers, superintendent of Salt Lake City schools. "I'd love to look at our local scores if we can extract them, because we've been trying to attend to it in the past couple of years."

According to the report, Utah Hispanic eighth-graders scored 6 points lower than the national Hispanic average in math and 2 points under in reading. Hispanic fourth-graders were also under the average by 2 points in reading and 5 points in math.

Fourth-grade Asian and Pacific Islanders scored 16 points lower in math and 9 points lower in reading than those in their national group, while eighth-graders scored 21 points lower in math and 4 points lower in reading.

Utah's sample size in other ethnic groups was too small to reliably report.

But on the other hand, students coming from poverty in Utah scored above the nation's average across the board.

The report also shows that from 2003, there remains a 22-point difference in math scores between white and Hispanic students in fourth grade. However, the gap in eighth-grade math dropped from 36 points in 2003 to 28 points in 2005.

The gap between white and Hispanic students for reading performance dropped from 29 points to 27 in fourth grade and from 27 to 22 points in eighth grade.

Girls continue to outperform boys by 10 points in both grades in reading but there was no large statistical difference in the mathematical performance of boys and girls in either grade in either year.

"There needs to be a continuing concerted and focused effort on the achievement gap," said Charlene Lui, chair of the Coalition of Minorities Advisory Committee for the State Office of Education. "We know groups are improving — NCLB has brought this accountability focus and (educators) are really looking at what we need to do to meet the needs of our culturally and linguistically diverse students."

Sanderson said though the the achievement gap is holding steady in some areas, both white and minority scores are going up. However, as white student scores increase minority groups must increase even more for gaps to decrease.

Gaps in achievement trends aren't exclusive to Utah, and the state is joined by many others concerned with snuffing out disparities in ethnic and economic subgroups.

The Governor's Working Group on Student Achievement began examining Utah's achievement gap this summer

The group was supposed to give its recommendations to close gaps — including money to help students at risk for academic failure and considerations for funding full-day kindergarten and preschools in schools enrolling at-risk students — at the legislative Education Interim Committee Wednesday. But other presentations and discussions on matters including charter schools and school buildings ran long, and the group got bumped.

"We're obviously disappointed the work the committee had done to prepare . . . to instruct legislators on the process of the last five months was delayed," said Gov. Jon Huntsman's education deputy, Tim Bridgewater.

The group was expected to be placed on the November committee agenda.

For more information on NAEP visit www.nationsreportcard.gov.

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Contributing: The Associated Press

E-mail: terickson@desnews.com