I spent a few hours digging into the recently released 2015 NAEP TUDA data. The results didn’t get much media coverage. That’s a shame because these are the best assessments for understanding student performance in (and comparing the results of) America’s biggest urban districts.
It’s a treasure trove of information, and it tells hundreds of stories. I encourage you to get into the numbers and see what pops for you.
I tried to condense my big takeaways into six headlines and images.
1. We’ve been trying to improve urban districts for half a century. These are the results. No district is able to get even one in five black kids up to proficiency in eighth-grade math or reading.
![Click to enlarge](https://i0.wp.com/www.educationnext.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/ednext-blog-nov15-smarick-tuda1-small.png?resize=450%2C194)
2. Across the participating districts, there has been meager progress in both subjects and both grades for more than a decade.
![Click to enlarge](https://i0.wp.com/www.educationnext.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/ednext-blog-nov15-smarick-tuda2-smallpng.png?resize=450%2C163)
3. A few districts, however, have made gains over time, most notably Atlanta, Chicago, D.C., and Los Angeles. They deserve credit.
![Click to enlarge](https://i0.wp.com/www.educationnext.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/ednext-blog-nov15-smarick-tuda3-small.png?resize=450%2C272)
4. Instances of progress deserve attention because progress is not guaranteed. For example, several districts have made virtually no headway in eighth-grade reading among low-income kids.
![Click to enlarge](https://i0.wp.com/www.educationnext.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/ednext-blog-nov15-smarick-tuda4-small.png?resize=450%2C296)
5. The districts that have made the most progress are the ones that started the farthest behind a decade ago. So despite consistent progress, Atlanta, Chicago, D.C., and Los Angeles are either at or still below the performance of the average large urban district.
![Click to enlarge](https://i0.wp.com/www.educationnext.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/ednext-blog-nov15-smarick-tuda5-small.png?resize=450%2C267)
6. It is essential when looking at NAEP TUDA data to always disaggregate the results (hence my focus above on black and low-income kids). The achievement gap in urban districts is larger than the achievement gap in the rest of the nation. White and non-poor students in urban districts are generally high-performing. Their results can skew citywide results.
![Click to enlarge](https://i0.wp.com/www.educationnext.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/ednext-blog-nov15-smarick-tuda6-small.png?resize=450%2C230)
—Andy Smarick
This post originally appeared on the Fordham Institute’s Flypaper.