The report card from the National Assessment of Educational Progress last week returned some dismal results as measured by student test scores, except for a few successes in states with expansive and long-standing school choice programs.
The NAEP test, used to measure reading and math scores of 4th and 8th grade students showed that student growth is stagnant at best and regressing at worst. Average student scores remain well below what states consider to be “proficient” for each grade level, and this trend has continued since the late 2000s. Until that year, scores steadily increased, but have leveled out, and even declined since.
Only two states – Florida and Massachusetts – witnessed improvements in scores, a fact that Education Secretary Betsy DeVos suggests might be due to their focus on expanding options for families through school choice.
DeVos has frequently praised Florida as a model for choice programs, as it has many charter school options and a taxpayer-funded scholarship for low-income families to send their children to private school. Likewise, Massachusetts has been celebrated for its strong accountability in the charter school sector as it bolsters high-performing schools and shutters ineffective ones.
Additionally, scores in Florida’s traditional public schools were also strong, suggesting (as some experts argue) that school choice programs which expand access to private schools also benefit the schooling system as a whole.
As states look to respond to their own report cards replete with F’s, they might benefit from studying the specific successes of Florida and Massachusetts. Policy exemplars exist. Often it is only politics that hampers implementation.
