AZ Hispanics far outstrip whites in NAEP gains

by David Safier

After my post earlier today analyzing Arizona's largest-in-the-nation jump in 4th grade math scores on the 2011 NAEP (a closer look makes this achievement far less awe inspiring than it sounds), I decided to explore something else. I wondered, did Hispanics make larger gains than whites in Arizona on the NAEP tests in general?

The answer is yes, in 3 out of 4 scores:

• 4th Grade Math: Hispanics, +6; Whites, +3; National Average, +1 [Note: In 2009, Arizona fell 2 points in 4th grade math, so the 2011 increase is inflated by the previous decrease.]
• 4th Grade Reading: Hispanics, +5; White, 0 (no change); National Average, +2
• 8th Grade Math: Hispanics, +1; Whites, +2; National Average, +1
• 8th Grade Reading: Hispanics, +5; Whites, +2, National Average, +3

Arizona's white students outscored the national average twice — 4th grade math and 8th grade math — but as I've said before, the 2 point drop in the 2009 4th grade math score skews that score upward. In fact, the only place Arizona's white students truly did better than the national average is in 8th grade math, by one point, and they were below the average gains in two categories. Arizona's Hispanics, on the other hand, topped the average gains 3 times and equaled it once.

Here's my unscientific but, I think, logical analysis of the findings. Due to demographic factors, the scores of Arizona's white students reflect the changes in NAEP achievement from 2009 to 2011 more accurately than that of Hispanic students, which means Arizona actually stayed in the same place or slipped a bit in relation to the national average. Given that this state's students lurk near the bottom on NAEP scores, this year's scores are nothing to be proud of.

SB1070 very likely drove some Hispanics with undocumented family members out of state. The students in those families most likely tended to be on the lower end of Hispanic achievement, because the families' English is more likely poorer than among other Hispanic families and very possibly the parents' educational attainment is lower. If I'm correct about this, a rise in average Hispanic achievement reflects a changed population as much as, or more than, a rise in individual achievement.

During those same two years, because of the economic downturn, fewer people were moving to Arizona, meaning fewer new white families arrived. Since I've heard nothing about white families leaving the state, the white student population was probably reasonably stable from 2009 to 2011. That would mean the NAEP scores of white students would be a reasonably accurate reflection of the actual change in academic achievement in the state.

This flies in the face of what we've read in the media and what Ed Supe John Huppenthal is trying to push, that Arizona has made significant gains in some areas of K-12 education. No, schools probably didn't manage to do more with less. No, whatever "reforms" were enacted probably didn't drive student achievement upward. A careful analysis reveals we're pretty much where we were in educational achievement relative to the rest of the nation a few years ago, if not a little bit worse.