A new study was recently released: Taking the Pulse of Bioscience Education in America: A State by State Analysis. Essentially, the study takes a look at science/biology scores per state in ACT, NAEP, AP along with other factors to see how well middle and high school students are being prepared in the life sciences for possible future careers in the biosciences. The breakdown of the states looks like this:
— Leaders of the Pack: Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Ohio, Vermont, Wisconsin
— Second Tier: Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Missouri, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, Washington
— Middling Performance: Alabama, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Montana, South Carolina, Wyoming
— Lagging Performance: Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, West Virginia
— Not Rated: States that do not participate in the NAEP science assessment were not rated.
If you take a look at the maps included in the full report, you will see that science education performance — high or low — is a regional phenomenon rather than an individual state one. But that shouldn’t be used as an excuse for Florida, which has been trying to attract the bioscience industry for a few years now. Our state is right there at the bottom of most of the study’s indicators except for Advanced Placement course participation.
There are problems across the nation, though:
On average, only 28% of the high school students taking the ACT , which is a national standardized test for college admission, reached a score indicating college readiness for biology and no state reached even 50%.
I was originally going to comment that the problem is that the new standards have not been fully implemented (or at least that the kids have not studied under them for several years), but looking at all of the scores I am not sure that is true.
It might explain the NAEP scores but certainly not the AP scores. At least my understanding is that AP classes have a standard curriculum. To me the AP scores are really troubling.
The other thing I was going to say was that teacher training may be a big problem but seeing that 83% of teachers have a major in the field, I can’t even say that. These teachers should know their field.
One variable that I always want to look at is the number of kids taking the test and a comparison to other states of that value. I have always found that the number of students taking the test is negatively correlated with performance. The more kids (or % of kids in the total population) that the test the lower these standardized test become. I.E the score becomes closer to the mean of all scores of the population rather than the select group. This could be a contributing factor for ACT and AP scores. I would consider the students taking AP to be a select group.
Are districts moving kids into AP classes even if there is likelihood that they will not get high marks (or college credit)? That would lower average scores but still might be good for the kids’ education with them taking a more rigorous class than they would get in the standard class.
Joe,
I know in my district (Seminole County) there is a big push to increase total numbers in AP classes. Just yesterday, I was told that the school grading formula for next school year will include both how many (I suspect as a percentage of total students) are taking AP classes as well as AP pass rates.
Yes, I agree the methodology of making these sorts of comparisons can sometimes be problematic.