Commissioner, National Center for Education Statistics National
Assessment of Educational Progress Achievement Gaps: How
Hispanic and White Students in Public Schools Perform in
Mathematics and Reading on the National Assessment of
Educational Progress June 23, 2011 Good afternoon. Today we’re
releasing our report on achievement gaps—the differences in
performance of Hispanic and White students as they have changed
over time, using national and state data for mathematics and
reading from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, or
NAEP. As this report will show, scores for both Hispanic and
White students have improved over time, but for the most part
the gaps remain significant, at both the state and national
levels. While many reports show that, on average, White students
have higher scores than Hispanic students, today’s report is the
first to focus on the Hispanic-White achievement gap at the
state level. This report provides an accessible summary of gap
data for every state—how the gaps stood in