Close the NC school test ‘gap’

Phil Berger, president pro tem of the state Senate, was quick to take a bow because the reading scores of fourth-graders in North Carolina improved in the most recent tests. Berger pushed a law requiring that students be reading at grade level by the end of third grade or risk being held back.

Berger shouldn’t hold that bow too long. Achievement test scores in general also showed a profoundly disturbing trend: that lower-income students are falling behind their more affluent counterparts. In other words, the achievement gap is widening in most areas.

Berger’s punitive approach to reading skills also might not show long-term benefits. But certainly, he and his fellow Republican lawmakers need to take public schools out of the bull’s-eye (vouchers, more charter schools, targeting teacher assistants) and put them on the priority list. A school system in which the poor get poorer forecasts a decline in public educational opportunities for those who can most benefit from them. The senator ought to be pushing for more investment in public schools and more focus on helping low-income students get help that will push them higher in their achievement, fulfilling the noble promiseof public education to give all students opportunity.

This story was originally published October 29, 2015 at 6:03 PM with the headline "Close the NC school test ‘gap’."