National Assessment of Educational Progress
Reporting Groups

Understanding NAEP Reporting Groups

NAEP results are provided for groups of students defined by shared characteristics—gender, race/ethnicity, parental education, region of the country, type of school, school's type of location, and eligibility for free/reduced-price school lunch. Based on participation rate criteria, results are reported for subpopulations only when sufficient numbers of students and adequate school representation are present. The minimum requirement is at least 62 students in a particular subgroup from at least five primary sampling units (PSUs). However, the data for all students, regardless of whether their subgroup was reported separately, were included in computing overall results. Definitions of the subpopulations are presented below.

Gender: Results are reported separately for male students and female students.

Race/Ethnicity: In all NAEP assessments, data about student race/ethnicity is collected from two sources: school records and student self-reports. Prior to 2002, NAEP used students' self-reported race as the primary race/ethnicity reporting variable. Beginning in 2002, the race/ethnicity variable presented in NAEP reports has been based on the race reported by the school. When school-recorded information is missing, student-reported data are used to determine race/ethnicity. The mutually exclusive racial/ethnic categories are White (non-Hispanic), Black (non-Hispanic), Hispanic, Asian/Pacific Islander, American Indian (including Alaska Native), and Unclassified. Hispanic students may be of any race. Information based on student self-reported race/ethnicity is available on the NAEP Data Explorer ( http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/nde/ ).

Parental Education: Eighth-graders were asked the following two questions, the responses to which were combined to derive the parental education variable:

How far in school did your mother go?

• She did not finish high school.
• She graduated from high school.
• She had some education after high school.
• She graduated from college.
• I don't know.

How far in school did your father go?

• He did not finish high school.
• He graduated from high school.
• He had some education after high school.
• He graduated from college.
• I don't know.

The information was combined into one parental-education reporting variable in the following way: If a student indicated the extent of education for only one parent, that level was included in the data. If a student indicated the extent of education for both parents, the higher of the two levels was included in the data. If a student responded "I don't know" for both parents, or responded "I don't know" for one parent and did not respond for the other, the parental education level was classified as "I don't know." If the student did not respond for either parent, the student was recorded as having provided no response. Fourth-graders' replies to this question are not reported because their responses to previous NAEP assessments were unreliable, and a large percentage of them chose the "I don't know" option.

Region of the Country: Prior to 2003, NAEP results were reported for four NAEP-defined regions of the nation: Northeast, Southeast, Central, and West. As of 2003, to align NAEP with other federal data collections, NAEP analysis and reports have used the U.S. Census Bureau's definition of "region." The four regions defined by the U.S. Census Bureau are Northeast, South, Midwest, and West. The Central region used by NAEP before 2003 contained the same states as the Midwest region defined by the U.S. Census. The former Southeast region consisted of the states in the Census-defined South minus Delaware, the District of Columbia, Maryland, Oklahoma, Texas, and the section of Virginia in the District of Columbia metropolitan area. The former West region consisted of Oklahoma, Texas, and the states in the Census-defined West. The former Northeast region consisted of the states in the Census-defined Northeast plus Delaware, the District of Columbia, Maryland, and the section of Virginia in the District of Columbia metropolitan area. Therefore trend data by region are not provided for the 2005 science assessment. Figure A-2 shows how states are subdivided into these Census regions. All 50 states and the District of Columbia are listed. Other jurisdictions, including the Department of Defense Educational Activity schools, are not assigned to any region.

Figure A-2. States within regions of the country defined by the U.S. Census Bureau

Type of School: Results are reported by the type of school that the student attends—public or private. Private schools include Catholic and other private schools.18 Because they are funded by federal authorities (not state/local governments), Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) schools and Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) schools are not included in either the public or private categories; they are included in the overall national results. State-level reporting in NAEP includes only public schools. The national sample reporting for NAEP includes public, private, the DoDEA, and BIA schools.

Type of Location: Results from the 2005 assessment are reported for students attending schools in three mutually exclusive location types: central city, urban fringe/large town, and rural/small town. A school's type of location is based on its physical location (as provided by addresses in the NCES Common Core of Data) and on characteristics of the population in that location. Classifications are based on three factors: (1) a school's location within or outside a metropolitan area (as defined by standards of the U. S. Office of Management and Budget), (2) a school's location in a

city or town designated as either urban or rural (based on U. S. Census Bureau classifications [see http://www.census.gov/ ]), and (3) the population size of that city or town (also based on U.S. Census data). A metropolitan area typically includes at least one principal city with a population of at least 50,000 and adjacent areas that have economic and social ties with the urban center. Metropolitan areas are coterminous with county boundaries.

Because a substantial number of schools have recently changed classification, 2005 results for the three types of location cannot be compared to previous years. The changes in classification were due to better location addresses, improved procedures in matching the addresses to Census Bureau files, and the use of updated census figures to determine the population size of cities and towns. The classification of schools within the large city component of the central city category, which is used in the reporting of results from NAEP's Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA), did not change substantially in 2005.

Central city: The central city category includes schools located in a large city (a principal city of a metropolitan area having a population of at least 250,000) and those located in a mid-size city (a principal city of a metropolitan area having a population less than 250,000). Central city is a geographical term and is not synonymous with "inner city."

Urban fringe/large town: The urban fringe category includes schools located within a metropolitan area of a large or midsized city, in a city or town which is classified as urban by the U.S. Census Bureau, but which does not qualify as a principal city. The large town category includes schools located outside a metropolitan area in a town with a population of at least 25,000.

Rural/small town: The rural category includes all locations within or outside a statistical area that are classified as rural by the U.S. Census Bureau. The small town category includes schools outside a metropolitan area in a town with a population of at least 2,500, but less than or equal to 25,000.

Eligibility for Free/Reduced-Price School Lunch: As part of the Department of Agriculture's National School Lunch Program, schools can receive cash subsidies and donated commodities in turn for offering free or reduced-price lunches to eligible children. Based on available school records, students were classified as either currently eligible for free/reduced-price school lunch or not eligible. Eligibility for the program is determined by students' family income in relation to the federally established poverty level. Free lunch qualification is set at 130 percent of the poverty level or below, and reduced-price lunch qualification is set at between 130 and 185 percent of the poverty level. In some circumstances, such as the case in the Cleveland school district, the national school lunch program permits school-wide eligibility without verifying the income status of each family. Additional information on eligibility may be found at the

Department of Agriculture website ( http://www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/lunch/ ). The classification applies only to the school year when the assessment was administered (i.e., the 2004–2005 school year) and is not based on eligibility in previous years. If school records were not available, the student was classified as "Information not available." If the school did not participate in the program, all students in that school were classified as "Information not available."

All students in schools participating in Provisions 2 or 3 of the NSLP were coded as “free lunch.” Under Provisions 2 and 3, schools provide free lunches to all students in the school.

Source: Appendix A, Overview of Procedures Used for the NAEP 2005 Assessment, State Report Generator

For the NAEP national assessments prior to 2002, a PSU is a selected geographic region (a county, group of counties, or metropolitan statistical area). Since 2002, the first-stage sampling units are schools (public and nonpublic) in the selection of the combined sample. Further details about the procedure for determining minimum sample size will appear in the technical documentation section of the NAEP website ( http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard ).