Misleading us again

The Prichard Committee is at it again with a new edition of their Top 20 by 2020 report series.

Once more Prichard is improperly ranking National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) white students in Kentucky against lower performing racial minorities in other states, trying to make the Bluegrass State’s educational performance look better than it really is.

Prichard probably won’t ever stop their apples to oranges NAEP rankings, but it does give me a chance to point to better pictures of what is really happening.

In fact, I posted a pretty good blog about this nonsense only about a week and a half ago, so I am not going to waste a lot of time on the new, really same-old, same-old, nonsense that came out today.

But, one area I haven’t really discussed is the eighth grade science picture. I just fired up the NAEP Data Explorer to see how Kentucky’s whites stacked up against their white counterparts in other states in 2015 NAEP science testing.

The answer doesn’t look so good.

g8-science-for-whites-ranked

There we are, way down in the 41st listing in the table. Only two states with scores reported had science performance for their white students that was statistically significantly worse. Even Mississippi’s whites tied with us once you consider the statistical sampling errors in the NAEP scores. Those pesky folks from Tennessee outclassed us, too.

By the way, even Prichard had to admit Kentucky’s eighth grade NAEP math performance looks “disturbing.” But, after you look at the table above and my blog from a week-and-a-half ago, you will know that’s only part of the “disturbing” picture.‘Nuff said.