The Nation's Report Card: Science Highlights 2000

Results for the 2000 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment show no significant change in grades 4 and 8, and a decline in performance at grade 12 since 1996.

Significantly different from 2000.

Source: National Center for Education Statistics, National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), 1996 and 2000 Science Assessments.

This science assessment was first administered to nationally representative samples of fourth-, eighth-, and twelfth-grade students in 1996. The figure above shows national average scores in 1996 and 2000 based on the 0-to-300 NAEP science scale at each grade.

In 2000, the average scores of fourth- and eighth-graders were essentially unchanged from 1996. The only significant change in average score results occurred at grade 12, where there was a three-point decline in students' average score.

It should be noted that every test score has a standard error of measurement--a range of a few points plus or minus the score. Therefore, when tests of statistical significance are used to compare scores between years, factoring in this standard error may yield apparently small differences that are statistically significant or, conversely, large differences that are not. Only statistically significant differences are cited in this report.