
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, May 3, 1990                   TAG: 9005030391
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

STUDENTS SINK EVEN LOWER ON CHART

Despite ballyhooed efforts at education reform, student achievement is continuing a decline that began three years ago, the government said Wednesday in a controversial report.

Education Secretary Lauro Cavazos said the annual state-by-state performance chart, popularly called the wall chart, "makes it clear that, as a nation, we are still not seriously committed to improving education for all Americans."

The chart has been criticized as promoting flawed data and making unfair state comparisons. Timothy Dyer, executive director of the National Association of Secondary School Principals, said American "young people are simply too complex to hang on a wall."

The chart, he said, "has as much to offer educational improvement as the Edsel offered the automotive industry."

Cavazos, however, defended the chart.

"It is the only national measurement of educational performance," he said. "It's the best that we have. Until we develop other measures, we will have to rely on the wall chart."

Officials say the White House argued for abandoning the 7-year-old practice this year because President Bush and the nation's governors had worked to develop national education goals and still are devising more accurate forms of assessment.

The report found that the average American College Testing Program examination scores declined nationally by 0.2 of a point, to 18.6, from 1988 to 1989, while the average Scholastic Aptitude Test scores declined by one point, to 903, during the same period.

A perfect ACT score is 36; a perfect SAT score is 1,600.

The report also found that the national high school graduation rate declined from 71.7 percent to 71.1 percent from 1987 to 1988; the percentage of public high school graduates who received a qualifying score on advanced placement examinations declined from 8.8 percent to 8.6 percent between 1988 and 1989.

Bill Honig, California superintendent of public instruction, said the chart "causes more mischief than benefit" because much of the data is a rehash of statistics already made public.

Keith Geiger, president of the National Education Association, said the chart "only continues to confuse and frustrate the public."

Monty Neill, associate director of the National Center for Fair & Open Testing, said the chart should include a consumer protection label: "Warning! Misuse of Standardized Test Scores Can Damange the Nation's Educational Health."

by CNB