STEM educators and advocates will find much to cheer about in the results of latest National Assessment of Educational Progress in Technology and Engineering Literacy (TEL).

Administered last year to a nationally representative sample of about 15,400 eighth graders from some 600 public and private schools across the country, the digitally based assessment showed overall gains in students’ ability to solve problems and apply their general understanding to such real-life tasks as designing a safe bike lane.  Average scores rose across all content areas and practices. And almost half of the students (46 percent) scored at or above proficient on the 2018 assessment, compared with 43 percent in 2014, when NAEP TEL was first administered.

More students also reported taking at least one class related to engineering and technology, 57 percent versus 53 percent – a rise that may reflect the Next Generation Science Standards’ emphasis on engineering design and cross-cutting concepts. More than two thirds (68 percent) had learned about or discussed designing or creating something to solve a problem “at least sometimes” in school, with 29 percent reporting that they had taken something apart to fix it or see how it worked more that five times outside of school. Both activities correlated with higher NAEP scores.

While many groups saw improved performance, the jump was particularly striking for girls, who went from outperforming their male counterparts by 3 points in 2014 to 5 points in 2018. The largest gender differences – 7 points each – were on the “Information and Communication Technology” content area and the “Communicating and Collaborating” practice area. “Boys were particularly poor, for example, at properly crediting other people for their work and ideas, something they were significantly less likely to say they learned about or discussed in school,” reports Education Week (4/30/19).

There were other gaps as well. Despite a 5 percent rise in the proportion of African-American students scoring at or above proficient in 2018, and greater percentages of white students (by 2 percentage points) and Asian students (by 6 percentage points) reaching the advanced level, the average scores for black, Hispanic, low-income, and disabled students lagged their white, Asian, more affluent, and non-disabled peers. In addition, low-income students were significantly less likely to have taken an engineering, robotics, or technology class. So were girls.

“As a woman and an engineer, I am excited to see that girls are doing so well on TEL,” Tonya Matthews, the vice chair of the National Assessment Governing Board. which oversees the NAEP, noted in news release. “ But she hoped the “real differences” in access to engineering and technology experiences reflected in the TEL results would “spur more action to create equitable opportunities for all learners.”

Watch the NAEP TEL release, which was live-streamed from North Carolina State University on April 30, 2019.

Filed under: K-12 Education News

Tags: CTE, K-12 engineering, NAEP TEL, nation's report card, national assessment of educational progress, Public Policy, STEM education