Today the National Center for Education Statistics is releasing findings from the National Assessment of Educational Progress 2002 Trial Urban District Assessment for both reading and writing. Fourth- and eighth-grade public school students in five large urban school districts-New York City Public Schools, Los Angeles Unified, Chicago School District 299, Houston Independent School District, and Atlanta City-participated in the assessment. In addition, the report includes scores for public school students in the District of Columbia, which has frequently participated in NAEP state assessments.

2002 Trial Urban District Assessment Map: Students participating in the Trial Urban District Assessments were assessed as part of the 2002 Reading and Writing Assessments. National and state results for these assessments were released earlier this summer. This map shows the location of the urban school districts for both assessments in 2002 and helps to put the results in context by showing the demographic composition of the fourth-grade student population in each district.

The New York City Public School population is close to 40 percent Hispanic, over 30 percent Black, and about 15 percent White. In the Washington, DC school district the fourth-grade student population is predominately Black. The fourth-grade student population in the Atlanta City School District is also predominately Black. The Houston Independent School district has large Hispanic and Black student populations. Chicago School District 299 also has large Hispanic and Black populations. And, in the Los Angeles Unified school district, the fourth-grade population is 72 percent Hispanic.

The districts range in size from the Atlanta City school district, the 36th largest school district in the country with close to 60,000 students, to New York City Public Schools, the country's largest, with over one million.

Demographic Profile of Participating Districts, Grade 4 and 8 Public Schools: The average percentage of fourth- and eighth-grade minority students in the six urban districts can be compared to the national public school population and to the public school population for "central city" areas across the nation. These central city areas are defined by the Office of Management and Budget, and implemented by the Census Bureau. Central city areas include the nation's largest cities; they also include much smaller cities-like Lawton Oklahoma and Parkersburg, West Virginia. Thus, not all central cities are what are typically referred to as inner cities. The percentages of fourth and eighth grade students in each district from low-income families, as measured by eligibility for free or reduced price lunch can also be compared to the national public school population and to the public school population for "central city" areas across the nation.

The six urban districts have a higher percentage of minority students than either the nation or central cities. The same pattern is evident in the data for low-income students.

Note that data are not reported for New York at the eighth grade due to a low response rate. In addition, low-income data were not available for eighth graders in Los Angeles.

All NAEP assessments are based on samples. With samples, there is a margin of error associated with each score. When comparisons are drawn between scores, or between the percentages of students at the various achievement levels, the differences must be tested to determine if they are larger than the margin of error involved (i.e., differences that are statistically significant.) On the PowerPoint slides that accompany this document, these differences are marked in the tables by asterisks and in the figures by up and down arrows.

Features of the Reading Assessment: The students who took the NAEP Reading Assessment read completed texts appropriate to their grade. The texts reflected the purposes of reading: Reading for literary experience, reading to gain information, and reading to perform a task. Both fourth- and eighth-graders were assessed on the first two purposes. Only eighth-graders were assessed on reading to perform a task. All students responded to a combination of multiple-choice and written-answer questions.

NAEP reading scores for both the fourth- and eighth-grades are presented on a single 0 to 500 point scale. Results are also reported according to three reading achievement levels established by the National Assessment Governing Board. These levels are intended to describe standards for what students should know and be able to do. The three achievement levels are defined as Basic, Proficient, and Advanced. Basic represents partial mastery of prerequisite knowledge and skills that are fundamental for proficient work at each grade. Proficient represents solid academic performance, and Advanced represents superior performance. NAGB believes that all students should be performing at or above the Proficient level.

Average Reading Scores, Grade 4 Public Schools: This table displays the grade four average reading scores for the participating urban districts, along with the national and central city averages. All six districts are below the national average. Only New York and Houston are comparable to the central city average.

Comparisons of Average Reading Scores, Grade 4 Public Schools, by Urban District: This figure allows comparisons across districts. For example, the "New York City" row indicates that New York's average was lower than the national average, but higher than Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, and the District of Columbia.

Reading Achievement Level Percentages, Grade 4 Public Schools: This table shows the percentage of students scoring at or above Basic and at or above Proficient for the six districts. Once again, New York and Houston have numbers that are not significantly different from the central city figure, while the other four districts are well below it.

Average Reading Scores, by Race/Ethnicity, Grade 4 Public Schools: This table gives average reading scores according to race/ethnicity. White students in Atlanta and the District of Columbia scored higher than White students in the nation and in central cities. Similarly, Asian Pacific Islander students in New York City outperformed their peers in central cities across the nation. In contrast, Black students in Chicago, the District of Columbia, and Los Angeles did not score as well as Black students in the nation as a whole or as Black students in central cities across the nation. The same is true when the scores of Hispanic students in Chicago and Los Angeles are compared to those of Hispanic students in the Nation. Despite these differences much of the variation in the overall scores is due to the difference in the makeup of the student populations. Scores for Asian/Pacific Islanders are omitted in four districts, because only Los Angeles and New York City had populations large enough to provide meaningful data.

Average Reading Scores, Grade 8 Public Schools: This table gives average reading scores for eighth-graders, as well as the national and central city averages.

Comparisons of Average Reading Scores, Grade 8 Public Schools: All five districts have average scores that are below both the national and central city average. Reading across for Chicago, as an example, it has scores that are higher than the District of Columbia, Los Angeles, and Atlanta.