Overall, U.S. students are performing better in math and science than students in foreign  countries. However, U.S. students  perform considerably behind the highest-achieving countries, based on a recent study released by the American Institutes for Research (AIR), a nonprofit behavioral and social science research organization based in Washington, D.C.

Dr. Gary Phillips, chief scientist at AIR and author of the report Chance Favors the Prepared Mind: Mathematics and Science Indicators for Comparing States and Nations, categorized students into three levels: basic, proficient and advanced. The report presents an in-depth evaluation of mathematic and science scores of eighth-grade students, both internationally and in each of the 50 U.S. states. The analysis reviews scores collected in 2005 and 2007 on the  National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) for U.S, students; compared to 2003 international data on the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) for students in other countries in grade 8.

 “If you think of states and nations as in a race to prepare the future generation of workers, scholars and citizens to be competent and competitive in a technologically complex world, then the states are in the middle of the pack,” said Dr. Phillips. “The bad news is that even our best-performing states are running far behind the highest-performing countries.”

Nearly all states in the U.S. lag significantly behind on mathematic scores when compared to those in Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan. However, students in Massachusetts are scoring on par with Japanese students in mathematics.  Students in Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont and Wisconsin perform equal to or better than those surveyed in nearly 45 countries, but trailed behind students in Singapore and Taiwan. 

On average, the District of Columbia student scored below the basic level, placing these students behind 29 other countries and ahead of only 14.

“The take away message from this report is that the United States is losing the race to prepare the minds of the future generation,” Dr. Phillips said. “The report shows the United States needs to substantially increase the scientific and mathematical competency of the general adult population so citizens can better understand and address many of the world’s most-pressing problems.”

“In addition we need larger numbers of people working in the scientific disciplines in order to better compete in a global economic environment,” Dr. Phillips said. “To achieve these goals, national and state policy makers need indicators of scientific and mathematical progress early in the educational pipeline.  It is argued that the strategy of linking NAEP to TIMSS helps to provide this system of indicators.”

--Olivia Majersky-Pullmann

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