Bad news before I go …
May 18, 2009
From a report released by BIO: The Biotechnology Industry Organization:
- On average, only 28% of the high school students taking the ACT , which is a national standardized test for college admission , reached a score indicating college readiness for biology and no state reached even 50%.
- Only 52% of 12th graders are at or above a basic level of achievement in the sciences, and for 8th graders only 57% are at a basic level of achievement.
- Average scores for 12th graders in the sciences have actually declined from 1996 to 2005 and shown no improvement for 8th graders both on overall and the life science component.
- A significant gap exists in science achievement for low-income middle-school students, although the gap is slowly narrowing.
Read more here.
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Ah! You have comments enabled here. That makes sense. You’re not getting away that easily.
I’d like to compare the science achievement numbers with the English-language skills, because the last time people were deploring math/science skills, the English skills were even worse. And how can someone answer a question if he or she can’t read it and compose a response?
Agreed. I’ve always told my classes that ID was the least of our problems and that we have bigger issues to take care of: general literacy and then science literacy. Grim. Very grim.