Statewide, the reports show more students are meeting or exceeding the standard and locally, eighth-grade students in both Bartow County and Cartersville have shown improvements in the areas of reading, English/Language Arts and social studies, while math and science scores are down significantly, ranging from six to 20 points in some areas.
Beginning next year, the state will be using the Common Core State Standards along with the College and Career Ready Performance Index made possible through the state's No Child Left Behind waiver.
"[The College and Career Ready Performance Index] is looking at the full scope of work that schools do to prepare them for college and careers. The testing is still a part of it, but no longer does the test become the single indicator of the school's performance," Superintendent John Barge previously said. "We're looking at graduation rates, we're looking at attendance rates, we're looking at readiness for post-secondary [education].
"The assessment becomes a part of [the index]. For example, students who are earning industry recognized credentials while still in high school, students who are passing advanced placement tests and earning college credit while still in high school, all of those are indicators that give schools points to an overall score, and that overall score will determine whether or not that school is making the progress they need to be making to be sure our students are college and career ready."
The scores for first-time test takers in the third grade as well as this year's eighth-grade scores compared to last year's seventh-grade scores are as follows:
For third-grade Bartow:
93.7 percent met or exceeded the standard for reading.
93.9 percent met or exceeded the standard for English/Language Arts.
84.9 percent met or exceeded the standard for math.
82.0 percent met or exceeded the standard for science.
79.7 percent met or exceeded the standard for social studies.
For eighth-grade Bartow:
97.3 percent met or exceeded the standard for reading, up from 2011 when 90.6 percent of seventh-graders met or exceeded the standard.
94.3 percent met or exceeded the standard for English/Language Arts, up from 2011 when 92.7 percent of seventh-graders met or exceeded the standard.
68.6 percent met or exceeded the standard for math, down from 2011 when 88.8 percent of seventh-graders met or exceeded the standard.
75.3 percent met or exceeded the standard for science, down from 2011 when 81.8 percent of seventh-graders met or exceeded the standard.
76.2 percent met or exceeded the standard for social studies, up from 2011 when 74.8 percent of seventh-graders met or exceeded the standard.
For third-grade Cartersville:
96.2 percent met or exceeded the standard for reading.
95.9 percent met or exceeded the standard for English/Language Arts.
90.2 percent met or exceeded the standard for math.
85.7 percent met or exceeded the standard for science.
88.2 percent met or exceeded the standard for social studies.
For eighth-grade Cartersville:
100.0 percent met or exceeded the standard for reading, up from 2011 when 98.3 percent met or exceeded the standard.
98.9 percent met or exceeded the standard for English/Language Arts, up from 2011 when 96.9 percent met or exceeded the standard.
88.0 percent met or exceeded the standard for math, down from 2011 when 95.8 percent met or exceeded the standard.
80.9 percent met or exceeded the standard for science, down from 2011, 89.7 percent met or exceeded the standard.
89.0 percent met or exceeded the standard for social studies, up from 2011 when 76.3 percent met or exceeded the standard.
Calls to the school systems were not returned at press time. For comments and reports on individual school results, read The Daily Tribune News.