SACRAMENTO

After several years of steady progress, California students made few gains on academic achievement tests last year, according to the latest results released Wednesday by the state Department of Education.

Even more worrisome, the double-digit achievement gap between black and Hispanic students and their white and Asian counterparts persists on the annual standardized tests, and does not appear to be linked solely to socioeconomic status.

"These are not just economic achievement gaps. These are racial achievement gaps. We cannot afford to excuse them," Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell said in a conference call with reporters.

For instance, the gap between white and black students in English language arts has remained at 31 percentage points since 2003, despite gains in that time for both groups. In math, the gap between white and black students has stayed at 28 percentage points, and similar gaps remain between white and Hispanic students.

When scores in the Standardized Testing and Reporting Program are broken down by ethnicity and poverty levels, white students from poor families performed better than black or Hispanic students who are not poor, O'Connell noted.

The state superintendent and other leaders have called the achievement gap the most pressing problem facing California schools, but they have not made much progress in addressing it.

O'Connell said educators need to examine whether they are truly holding all students to the same expectations and whether all schools and all students have access to the funds and teachers they need.

He said it is vital for the state to close the gap, "not just for the moral imperative, but for the economic imperative. These are the subgroups that are growing the fastest in our state."

Jim Lanich, president of California Business for Education Excellence, said state officials need to stop talking about the achievement gap and actually do something about it.