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National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP)
Assessment Home | Feedback | Contact Us | NAEP HomeDescription of NAEP Scoring Metrics
NAEP is an assessment of overall achievement rather than a diagnostic test for individuals or groups of students.
NAEP provides results about the following:
- Subject-Matter Achievement
- Instructional Experiences
- School Environment
These results are reported as follows:
- by populations of students (e.g., fourth-graders)
- by subgroups of those populations (e.g., male students, Hispanic students)
NAEP informs policymakers about relationships between student achievement and the following key background variables:
- Gender
- Race/Ethnicity
- Exceptionality (students with disabilities and English language learners)
- Socioeconomic Status
- Region of the Country
- Type of School Location
- Public or Nonpublic School.
NAEP also provides comparative data on the performance of states and the Nation.
NAEP does not provide scores for individual students or schools. Federal law requires that NAEP data on individual students and schools remain confidential.
Subject-matter achievement is reported in two ways—scale scores and achievement levels—so that student performance can be more easily understood.
Achievement levels offer a means of identifying percentages of students who have demonstrated certain subject specific proficiencies. Authorized by NAEP legislation and adopted by the National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB), the three achievement levels are performance standards based on the collective judgments of experts about what students should know and be able to do. The achievement levels are as follows:
- Basic
- Proficient
- Advanced
A below Basic achievement level is for those students whose scores fall below the cut score for Basic. NAGB believes that all students should reach the Proficient level by 2014.
Because NAEP scales and achievement levels are developed independently for each subject, student performance cannot be compared across subjects. However, these reporting metrics facilitate performance comparisons within a subject from year to year and from one group of students to another in the same grade.
Beginning in 2003, NAEP reading and mathematics state assessment scores for the 4th and 8th grades began providing an alternative measure of state educational progress under the No Child Left Behind Act.
Results from NAEP and the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) will differ for the following reasons:
- NAEP tests only a sample of students.
- Florida’s Sunshine State Standards (SSS) and the NAEP Frameworks are not exactly aligned.
- Florida’s FCAT Achievement Levels and NAEP Achievement Levels are not exactly aligned.
- FCAT is perceived as a high-stakes test while NAEP is not (motivational issues).