Long Island Schools show marked improvements on statewide math tests for grades three through eight. Albany educational authorities announced the dramatic improvements this month. Long Island Schools tend to mirror statewide improvements across the board. According to Newsday, Education Commissioner Richard Mills said, The fact that children are achieving higher standards in the middle grades is especially significant. Long Island Schools, and many across the nation, have faced the challenge of test scores dropping in the middle school years.
In its second year of reporting steady improvements, Long Island Schools are up in every grade and show impressive results. 85.2% of third graders passed, as opposed to 80.5% last year. And seventh graders increased scores from 55.6% to 66.4%. While not all residents in the Long Island Schools district support mandatory testing, these results are still welcome. New York State has the second largest per pupil spending of the 50 states, and often shows the results in impressive test scores. Even so, New York City districts, like the Long Island Schools, have felt pressure to attain the No Child Left Behind mandate to get all children...