Beat State Average : Math Scores Up, Reading Skills Drop

San Diego County high school seniors this year scored well above their peers statewide on the major standardized math and reading tests used to measure California’s educational pulse, according to results being released today.

But both county teachers and parents were urged Monday by county schools Supt. Thomas C. Boysen not to pat themselves on the back too hard.

Boysen pointed out that, although math results on the California Assessment Program (CAP) for most school districts in the county and statewide increased from last year’s test, reading scores dropped both in San Diego and throughout California schools, substantiating the continuing concern among educators about public-school curriculum and student preparation.

The CAP tested all California seniors in December in math, reading, editing (which includes spelling) and writing (with a required essay). Only math and reading scores are being reported today.

Results are not reported for individual students, since each student takes only a small portion of a total CAP test and may answer more questions in one skill area than another. But across an entire school or district, enough students take a sufficient number of all parts of a test to allow an accurate assessment.

Increase in Math Scores

In math, the county’s 16 secondary/high school districts averaged 270 out of 400, 14 points above the state average and a 6-point gain from last year, matching the statewide increase. San Diego Unified--the county’s largest district with 6,000 seniors and the nation’s eighth-largest urban district--met the 270 county average, a 7-point gain from 1987, which Boysen called a strong showing. The state average was 256.

But in reading, the county average dropped 3 points from last year, to 261. San Diego Unified dropped 1 point to 250. Although both were still above the statewide average of 248, Boysen emphasized the downward trend and called it disappointing.

“The state, through its model reading curriculum and its suggested new integrated language arts proposals, is trying to get students to do more reading, but we haven’t figured out how to do it (overall) yet,” said Boysen, who oversees the county office of education.

“This CAP test emphasizes higher-level reasoning skills, more analysis and inferential reading . . . and we haven’t yet closed the gap” between the 87% of seniors who can read at basic, eighth-grade level, contrasted with only 40% who can understand a newspaper op-ed page article or the 5% who can interpret a complex train or bus schedule, he said.

Boysen said too many seniors are still not working hard enough, citing statistics that show only 30% of California 12th-graders do two hours or more of homework a night, a small increase from 25% in 1983, before the latest push for educational reforms began in California and nationally.

“I look at the (reading scores) trend and, while the decline is not a huge difference, we are going in the wrong direction,” Boysen said.

State CAP administrators issue detailed analyses of results, which are designed to help districts and individual schools understand which of their particular curriculums need change. Although many educators criticize the general emphasis on standardized testing as promoting rote learning, they defend CAP as less egregious because it is designed by teachers and because it has been revamped to emphasize more problem-solving and comprehension skills.

Boysen said the increase in math scores probably results from increased graduation and college requirements for three years of math in high school. “So more students are taking math, and I think we are teaching it better,” he said, although adding that studies comparing American, European and Asian students in math comprehension continue to show that the United States ranks at the bottom.

Coronado Scored Highest

In reading results for county districts, Coronado scored highest with 318, followed by Poway, San Dieguito, Julian, Borrego Springs, Grossmont, Carlsbad, San Marcos, Escondido, Fallbrook and Ramona, all above the county average of 261. Vista and San Diego Unifed fell between the county average and the state average of 248, followed by Mountain Empire, Oceanside and Sweetwater with scores below the state average. A majority of Sweetwater district students are nonwhite, with many born in other countries and still learning English as a second language.

In math, San Dieguito topped all county scores with 334, followed by Coronado, Poway, Carlsbad, Grossmont and San Diego Unified, all at or above the county average of 270. San Marcos, Escondido, Fallbrook, Borrego Springs and Ramona scored above the state average of 256, and Julian, Vista, Sweetwater, Oceanside and Mountain Empire fell below the state average.

In both math and reading, the Sweetwater and Oceanside districts scored higher in relative rankings, where districts are compared to other schools in the state with similar socioeconomic factors, including the educational level of parents, the English fluency of students, the rate of student turnover during the year and the number of families receiving government assistance.

Conversely, Poway, Coronado and Carlsbad scored lower in relative rankings, where they are compared with other middle- to upper-middle-class schools in California. Ideally, schools wish to have both high absolute and relative rankings, administrators say. Both San Dieguito and Grossmont showed up well in both categories.

CALIFORNIA ASSESSMENT PROGRAM 1988-89 Grade 12 Reading Results for San Diego County School Districts.

1989 1989 1989 Scaled Score Scaled State Relative Change District Score Rank Rank From 1988 Coronado 318 95 72 +7 Poway 316 95 70 -8 San Dieguito 312 94 86 -7 Julian 299 89 95 +4 Borrego Springs 279 76 94 +4 Grossmont 272 69 70 +10 Carlsbad 270 65 53 -17 San Marcos 270 65 70 -21 Escondido 266 63 59 -15 Fallbrook 264 62 59 -17 Ramona 262 62 55 +14 County Average 261 -3 Vista 260 61 57 -11 San Diego City 250 53 41 -1 State Average 248 -2 Mtn. Empire 246 49 77 +28 Oceanside 241 45 54 -11 Sweetwater 226 28 53 -15