Report finds reading, math gains in urban schools

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Against the grain of mostly grim news from inner-city schools, a report released Tuesday found that those schools are making substantial progress in some areas.

An analysis of 55 city school systems in 35 states found that 47 percent of those districts improved their math scores and 34 percent improved their reading scores on state standardized tests during the last five years.

The report, "Beating the Odds," was put out by the Council of the Great City Schools, a coalition of urban school districts. Students in the schools analyzed represent 14.2 percent of the nation's public school students. About 70 percent are African American or Hispanic. The students are 50 percent more likely to be poor and three times as likely to be learning English as a second language as students in other schools.

The study's authors cited the gains as evidence that urban schools may have finally "established a beachhead on the rocky shoals of reform."

Although the report emphasizes gains in urban schools, it also states that these schools as a group still score below national averages. Bush administration officials have cited a lack of academic progress in inner-city schools as one reason to rally behind the White House's education agenda.

The National Assessment of Educational Progress, known as "The Nation's Report Card," recently found significant gains in central-city math trends in recent years, but found no improvement in reading achievement. The NAEP test is regarded as a particularly rigorous one, while state standardized tests can vary greatly in quality and difficulty.

"Beating the Odds" noted another positive trend in urban schools: a shrinking gap between white students, and black and Hispanic ones. In 68 percent of fourth graders tested, the gap between white and black reading scores decreased, while the gap between whites and Hispanics decreased in 59 percent.

At the same time, the report found that per-pupil expenditures in urban schools has slipped below the national average for the first time since the council began tracking funding. City per-pupil expenditures went up 1.3 percent in the last five years, compared to a national average of 8.8 percent during the same period.

The study found common themes in school districts that produced dramatic gains: setting fewer but clear goals focused on academic achievement, strengthening support for teachers, breaking down large urban schools into smaller more personal learning communities, and establishing strong accountability measurements.

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Council of the Great City Schools

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