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Today we’re releasing the new-and-improved edition of our annual “State of Rhode Island Public Education” report.
As always, it’s filled with information you can use about Rhode Island public schools, their achievement gaps and the policy work our state has done to date.
Click here to view the report.
As you’ll see, we’ve made minimal progress in student achievement over the last few years but overall performance has been relatively stagnant and our achievement gaps remain unacceptably large.
Other key findings in the report include:
- The graduation rate from our two-year colleges is the second lowest in the country. This is cause for concern because in 2018, 61 percent of Rhode Island’s jobs will require education beyond high school.
- According to NAEP (the Nation’s Report Card), fewer than 40% of our eighth-graders are proficient in math and reading – ranking us in the middle of the pack across the United States.
- Low-income students are a staggering 30 points behind their peers in math.
- Latino students remain 29 points behind their white peers in reading, a gap that’s six points higher than the national average.
We must continue our collective focus on providing all families with access to high quality public schools across the state – and advocate for policies that support that effort.