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Thousands of students in New York have their roots in Puerto Rico, and many make the trip back every year. When they do, they’re traveling to an island whose children lag behind other American students on a national test of math skills.

According to Education Week, Puerto Rican students have performed far worse than students in the nation as a whole on the math component of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, a test used to compare student performance across states. (The test, translated into Spanish, has been given in Puerto Rico since 2003. Puerto Rican students don’t take NAEP’s reading section.)

The students’ low scores mean that the many teachers in New York City whose students are recent arrivals from Puerto Rico must try to make up for the effects of a deficient school system. The number of students in city schools who have attended school in Puerto Rico is not available, a spokesperson for the Department of Education told me, but almost 800,000 residents of New York City identified as Puerto Rican in the 2000 census. (more…)

American fourth-graders' average score on a world science test: below Singapore but above Italy.

The test that every four years makes Americans feel bad about the kids these days, the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, is out with new results, not all of them bad: Fourth- and eighth-graders appear to be improving in math, and bottom performers made the most gains.

But in both grades, Americans remain stagnant in the (much less tested) subject of science. This is a good time to ask whether science gets enough attention. From the Christian Science Monitor:

The US still performs better in science than the average among TIMSS countries, but the lack of progress underscores what some educators and others say is a pressing need to give more attention to science education in this country, in addition to the emphasis on reading and math.

In spite of numerous reports, “many districts simply do not value science education,” reads a statement released Tuesday by the National Science Teachers Association in Virginia. “Science is being eliminated from many K-6 classrooms,” it says.

Recall that the city Department of Education recently rolled out new science curriculum in response to concerns that science was being sidelined in favor of tested subjects. But it then delayed creating tests to match the curriculum — for two years in a row.

The results are also a good reminder that, no matter how frustrating it is that American students are behind several nations, they are not behind everyone — not by far. (more…)