Kansas school test scores, an untold story

If the Kansas public school establishment wants to present an accurate assessment of Kansas schools, it should start with its presentation of NAEP scores.

Kansas public school leaders are proud of Kansas schools, partly because of scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), known as “The Nation’s Report Card.” Kansas ranks high among the states on this test. It’s important, however, to examine the results from a few different angles to make sure we understand the entire situation.

I’ve gathered scores from the 2013 administration of the test, which is the most recent data available. I present data in an interactive visualization that you may use through the links at the end of this article. The most widely available NAEP data is for two subjects: reading and math, and for two grades, fourth and eighth. In the nearby images captured from the visualizations, I present data for Kansas and the average for national public schools. I’ve also added Texas and Florida, as schools in those states have sometimes been mentioned in comparisons to Kansas. The numbers in the charts are the percent of students that score at or above proficient.

Considering all students, Kansas has the best scores for all combinations of grade levels and subjects, except for one.

When we compare black students only, we find Kansas outperformed by Texas in all cases. National public schools beat Kansas in one case, and tie in another.

Looking at Hispanic students only, Florida beats Kansas in three cases and ties in one. In some cases the difference is large.

Looking at white students only, Texas outperforms Kansas in all cases. National public schools score higher than Kansas in three of four cases.

Another way to look at test scores is to group students by eligibility for free or reduced school lunches. This is a widely used surrogate for family income. In this analysis Kansas performs better in comparison to other states, but Kansas is not always the best.

These visualizations are interactive, meaning that you may adjust parameters yourself. For the visualization grouping students by ethnicity, click here. For the visualization grouping students by school lunch eligibility, click here.