If you take the 1998 NAEP 8th grade reading scores by race, re-weight them by the new 2024 demographic makeup of American 8th graders, you will find a predicted point decline of 4.6, rather close to the actual 4 point fall over the period.

Over the same period, reading scores actually improved somewhat for each of the 1998 poorly scoring groups (and quite a bit for Asians), but the poorly scoring groups simply make up so much more of the population now that it drags everything else down.

|---|---:|---:|---:|

| White | *268* | *266* | −2 |

| Black | *242* | *243* | +1 |

| Hispanic | *241* | *245* | +4 |

| Asian/Pacific Islander | *261* | *280* | +19 |

| All public-school students | *261* | *257* | −4 |

|---|---:|---:|---:|

| White | *64.5%* | *44.0%* | −20.5 pp |

| Black | 16.1% | 14.9% | −1.2 pp |

| Hispanic | *14.3%* | *29.4%* | +15.1 pp |

| Asian/Pacific Islander* | 3.9% | 5.9% | +2.0 pp |

| American Indian/Alaska Native | 1.2% | 0.9% | −0.3 pp |

| Two or more races | not separately reported | 4.8% | — |

▲ shagie 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

With pre-formatted table:

    Group                           1998 NAEP  2024 NAEP  Change
    -----------------------------  ----------  ---------  ------
    White                                 268        266      −2
    Black                                 242        243      +1
    Hispanic                              241        245      +4
    Asian/Pacific Islander                261        280     +19
    All public-school students            261        257      −4

    Race/ethnicity                     1999 Grade 8  2023 Grade 8    Change
    ---------------------------------  ------------  ------------  --------
    White                                      64.5%         44.0%  −20.5 pp
    Black                                      16.1%         14.9%   −1.2 pp
    Hispanic                                   14.3%         29.4%  +15.1 pp
    Asian/Pacific Islander                      3.9%          5.9%   +2.0 pp
    American Indian/Alaska Native               1.2%          0.9%   −0.3 pp
    Two or more races                not separately reported  4.8%      -

▲ zug_zug 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The challenge here is that you're assuming performance by race should be constant over time. Maybe that's true, maybe it's not, I think a richer analysis with wealth, parental education, english as a first language cofounders might be helpful.

Also if you want to entertain the theory that it is racial/genetic, it'd be important to do that analysis on a continuum since a lot of people who are "minority X" may be more than 50% white or there may be trends in that over time.

▲

romaaeterna 2 hours ago | parent [-]

I don't assume that. See the first table, even better in shagie's nicely reformatted version.

You are the person in this discussion invoking race genetics. Why does your mind go there?

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yesitcan 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Because you grouped intelligence by race and showed that whites outperformed blacks and Mexicans.

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romaaeterna 36 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

Where did you come up with "Mexicans" or "intelligence"?

Doesn't it strike you that poor Hispanic reading performance might actually be largely related to Spanish vs. English-language proficiency?

▲

tick_tock_tick an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

He just picked the strongest predictive characteristic we have data on. You're the one trying to turn the statement into something it isn't.

> I think a richer analysis with wealth, parental education, english as a first language cofounders might be helpful.

We have all that data it's just significantly less predictive of outcome then race.

▲

kalkin an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

"roma aeterna" is also the sort of alias that's associated with a particular set of political views. (Not conclusive! But a rational thing for someone to notice.)

	▲	romaaeterna 35 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		There is a particular set of political views associated with people who read classical languages? I fail to see what you are calling "rational" here.

▲

pessimizer 34 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

They grouped performance, not intelligence.

If you don't think that what happened and is happening to black people affects our average performance on tests, you haven't eliminated racist assumptions, you've eliminated the entire black experience in America and any reason for a grudge or complaint.

Grouping a list of test performances by race shouldn't lead to an assumption of natural stupidity any more than grouping a list of incomes or wealth by race should lead to an assumption of natural laziness.

And the fact that you jump to that conclusion, and it makes you nervous, so you think it's bad to talk about the facts that remind you of that conclusion, does not help black people.

You could say the same thing about Hispanic economic migrants. You don't think that economic migrants from countries with good universities and healthy middle classes are going to score lower on tests? The ones that fly in are a different story, they're often elites, but the ones that walk in? They're bottom caste where they come from, and looking for a chance to change things.

▲ tdb7893 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Does this actually track over time or is it coincidence? I'm a bit confused why 1998 was chosen out of all years

▲

romaaeterna 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Coincidence? Of course not.

1998? I wanted a quarter century of Grade 8 and that gives me 1998 to 2024 with NAEP. 2000 reading assessment was Grade 4 only. You can do it with any pair of years.

▲

kalkin an hour ago | parent [-]

The article says that scores began drifting down around 2012. Gemini is telling me that NAEP peaked in 2013. Elsewhere in this thread there's a claim of an inflection point around 2018 in PISA, which eyeballing Gemini's numbers lines up with NAEP.

Does this correlate with the racial proportion data?

	▲	romaaeterna 6 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		If you graph actual NAEP since 1998 versus a 1998 group-fixed score, you'll see increases (1998-2002, 2005-2013, 2015-2017) and multiple declines twice taking the line back down to the 1998 linear trend prediction (2002-2005, 2017-2024). It is wrong to get overly exact here though. We are talking about a overall score variance of just 10pts in the face of an achievement gap of nearly 30pts, with an absolutely massive 20% decline in white population share over the 26 year period.