Undead Astronauts

asianweek looked at the 2009 NAEP (National Assessment of Education Progress) results and they confirm a recent trend in academic testing. asian seniors again outscored all other groups in NAEP math as they have historically, but also for the first time in english. asians topping english scores in NAEP follows similar outcomes with the SAT and ACT.

all races made gains from the last assessment in 2005. whites, blacks and hispanics all did 4-5 pts better. asians blew them out doing 12 pts better than in 2005. whatever failings the american education system has, it’s still doing better than it has in the past. when compared to scores in the 80s and 90s, last year’s scores are much much better for all groups.

the asian penchant for academic success hasn’t gone unnoticed by the majority. recently there have been a number of articles describing the new white flight, and now the wall street journal has one too. it covers familiar ground where some white parents don’t feel comfortable leaving their kids to compete with asians. in fact, some asian parents feel the same way. their concern is that schools with asian majorities do not reflect the real world simply b/c asians only comprise a small percentage of the US population. personally, i think it would’ve been great to see more asians at my alma mater. still, i’m not sure i’d be thrilled at competing against them either. hah!