While the percentage of New York City middle school students scoring at proficiency level (Level 3 and 4) dropped for all grades and all groups, it was much steeper for students from minority and poorer families.
With a youthful and inexperienced team, Collins has his team competing every night, playing defense (97.5 points allowed down from 101.6), rebounding the basketball, and scoring with proficiency while playing unselfish basketball (6th in assists as a team).
Respondents felt most proficient in Competency 6.2 "Interpret information for professional, non-professional and community audiences" with 97.1% scoring their proficiency as very good (50.0%) or outstanding (47.1%).
Respondents felt least proficient in Competency 3.4 "Implement a policy or program and/or take appropriate action to address a specific public health issue" with 35.3% scoring their proficiency as very good (26.5%) or outstanding (8.8%).
Times columnist Jim Murray, taking note of the goal-scoring proficiency, quipped that the threesome maybe should have been called The Red Light Line.
For more than five decades, business leaders, politicians, colleges and universities sold Americans the idea that academic test-score proficiency is the key to developing our workforce.
Public schools and districts here are "graded" already on a variety of measures--graduation rates, NJASK scores, proficiency levels--and reported incidents of harassment, intimidation and bullying now will be factored into that grading.
When asked to evaluate their overall proficiency across the Core Competencies at the beginning of their program, 5.7% of respondents scored their proficiency as very good, none rated their proficiency as outstanding, with the majority of respondents needing improvement (40.0%).
Mr. Davis said that 52 percent of last year's ninth graders scored below proficiency on their math and English eighth-grade exams.
In Bozeman, a university town where at least 90 percent of students scored above proficiency in reading this spring, 8 of the 10 schools would nonetheless have failed to meet rising targets.
