THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, August 26, 1994 TAG: 9408260611
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: STAFF AND WIRE REPORT
LENGTH: Medium: 93 lines
College-bound students in Norfolk, Suffolk and Portsmouth school districts overall scored well below state and national averages in both math and verbal skills on this year's SAT exam. Neither Virginia Beach nor Chesapeake has yet tabulated districtwide results.
Of the three cities reporting scores, Norfolk's students performed best overall with an average total score of 768.
Local officials said they needed more time to analyze the test data before drawing conclusions.
Norfolk officials said the scores of seniors in their school system are typical of inner-city urban areas beset by social problems such as crime, violence and drugs. Norfolk SAT scores have remained fairly stable during the past decade, but are down from a 1988 high of 385 in verbal and 430 in math.
``In light of so many negative events impacting on our schools, if our kids are still managing to hold ground, that's a good thing, even if we're still not where we'd like to be,'' said Lillian S. Holloway, a testing specialist for Norfolk Public Schools.
Statewide, college-bound students in Virginia scored 10 points below the national average in math and one point above in the verbal portion of the Scholastic Assessment Test. Virginia's average total SAT score this year was 893, compared to 902 nationwide. And Virginia students continued to score lower than theircounterparts did 10 years ago.
Virginia's female students improved in the verbal skills segment of the 1994 SAT and scored better than the national average, but they lagged further behind their counterparts nationally in math, results show.
``It is troubling,'' said Margaret A. Miller, the State Council of Higher Education's academic affairs chief. ``Clearly there's work for all of us to do, and that includes people in colleges and universities. We all have responsibility for making this situation better.''
Virginia's overall SAT scores have improved somewhat since 1991, particularly in math. But overall, Virginia verbal skills were one point lower than 1993.
Nearly two-thirds of Virginia's high school students take the college entrance exam. And those 40,529 students take a higher number of courses in core academic subject areas during high school than their counterparts nationally.
Virginia's female high school students may need more encouragement to take advanced math and science courses, Miller suggested. National studies have shown that girls are discouraged as youngsters from excelling in math or science.
Females in Virginia topped the national verbal exam average score by two points, and were four points over the ranking for all women. But in math, they trailed their male classmates by 37 points, and the males were 12 points lower than men nationwide.
Nationally, this year's SAT math score continued its 13-year rise, to 479 points out of a possible 800. The verbal score was 423, about the same as it was in 1980.
Virginia's black students, who represented 16 percent of the test group, had mean scores of 352 on verbal and 382 on math. Minority students are concentrated in large cities and rural areas where SAT scores routinely fall below the national average, the report said.
Asian students, the state's next largest minority group at 7 percent of test-takers, outpaced their Virginia classmates in math - 523 - but had lower verbal scores - 411.
Since 1976, however, black students' scores nationally have risen 20 points on verbal and 34 points on math, while the mean scores for white students fell by eight points and two points, respectively. A record 31 percent of test-takers this year were minority students, showing continued gains in the number of college-bound minority students nationally. ILLUSTRATION: Graphic
TOTAL SCORES
National
1993-94: 902
1992-93: 902
Virginia
1993-94: 893
1992-93: 894
Norfolk
1993-94: 768
1992-93: 769
Portsmouth
1993-94: 732
1992-93: 744
Suffolk
1993-94: 752
1992-93: 757
Results not available for Virginia Beach and Chesapeake.
Complete results for U.S., Virginia and cities/Page B4
KEYWORDS: STANDARDIZED ACHIEVEMENT TESTS STATISTICS by CNB