Supporting Effective Teaching in Tennessee: Executive Summary | Page 12
including a Governor’s task force on teacher effectiveness, the
Tennessee Board of Regents’ Teacher Quality Initiative, and the
State Board of Education’s Teacher Training Program Report
Card, all these efforts are still in their nascent stages. Third,
the state has never systematically focused on creating a highquality pipeline of superintendents and principals. Although the
State Board of Education recently passed a policy that in theory
would significantly improve the quality of principal training,
significant work remains to be done in turning this policy into
a reality. Fourth, although Tennessee has one of the best student
data systems in the country, more effort needs to be taken to
ensure policymakers, superintendents, principals, and teachers
use this data to effectively design policies and improve classroom
instruction. Finally, Tennessee is only in the initial stages of
learning how to effectively use technology in the classroom and
creating a seamless transition between high school and higher
education. Although the state has made some initial efforts in
both these areas, much work remains to be done.
Educational Outcomes
There are two primary types of educational outcomes that can
be measured and compared across states: student achievement
and educational attainment. Student achievement refers to
students’ performance on standardized tests. Educational
attainment refers to the level of education a student completes.
This section will first discuss student achievement and then
discuss educational attainment.
There are only two measures of student achievement that can
be compared across states. The first is the National Assessment
of Educational Progress (NAEP), a national test given every
two years to a representative sample of students in each state.
States are required to participate in the NAEP in order to receive
federal Title I funds. NAEP measures the achievement level of
fourth, eighth, and twelfth grade students in a variety of subjects
including reading, math, science, social studies, and writing.
However, states are only required to administer the fourth and
eighth grade math and reading tests in order to receive federal
funding. Figure 3.2 shows how each state performs on these
tests. The graph shows a composite scale score for each state, a
measure that was created by averaging each state’s fourth and
eighth grade reading and math scores.12
As Figure 3.2 illustrates, Tennessee ranks 41st in student
achievement on the NAEP. Overall, the Southeast performs
fairly poorly. With the exception of Virginia, whose average
NAEP score places the state in ninth place nationally, not a
single state in the Southeast scores in the top half. However,
even among the eleven Southeastern states, Tennessee ranks
eighth, above only Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana.i
Besides Virginia, the other leading Southeastern states are
North Carolina (29th), Florida (30th), and Kentucky (33rd).
The second measure of student achievement that can be
compared across states is college entrance exams, specifically
the ACT and the SAT. Tennessee students disproportionately
take the ACT rather than the SAT. For example, in the 2007-08
school year, 88 percent of Tennessee high school seniors took
the ACT.13 In many states, a much lower percentage of students
take either the ACT or SAT. Therefore, it is important to only
compare Tennessee’s score to the scores of other states who have
a high percentage of students taking either the ACT or SAT. Of
the 25 states where at least either 70 percent of graduates took
the SAT or 70 percent of graduates took the ACT in 2007-08,
Tennessee’s average score ranks 16th. Of the seven Southeastern
states with at least 70 percent of graduates taking either the
ACT or SAT, Tennessee ranks second. However, this ranking
is deceptive as many of the highest performing Southeastern
states, including North Carolina, Florida, and Virginia, did not
have over 70 percent of their students take either the SAT or
the ACT.
In addition to student achievement, educational outcomes can
also be measured by educational attainment, which measures
the timing and percentage of individuals receiving various
education credentials such as high school diplomas, associate’s
degrees, and bachelor’s degrees. Tennesseans are not earning
education credentials at a competitive rate relative to the rest of
the nation. The state ranks at or below the national average in
all measures of educational attain ment, including the statewide
high school graduation rate, percent of young people enrolled
in college, and college completion rate. In comparison to other
Southeastern states, Tennessee ranks in the middle, having a
slightly higher than average graduation rate but a below average
percentage of young people enrolled in college and a below
average college completion rate.
Tennessee has the nation’s 32nd highest graduation rate,
defined as the percent of entering high school freshmen
who graduate within four years. State graduation rates range
from 47.3 percent in Nevada to 82.1 percent in New Jersey.
Tennessee’s graduation rate of 69.5 percent is slightly above
the national average of 69.2 percent. Compared to other
Southeastern states, Tennessee ranks third behind Kentucky
and Arkansas. Moreover, from 1996 to 2006, Tennessee’s high
i The eleven states labeled as “Southeastern” in this report are Alabama,
Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North
Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia.
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