"In reading, 31 percent of fourth graders tested in Rhode Island were proficient, an increase of one percent from 2005, but just 27 percent of eighth graders were proficient, down from 29 percent two years ago."

Of course, the answer to this is to throw more money at the problem. Almost all of which will go into teacher's compensation and benefits and not into teaching the children.

Anyone remember how much better educated children were before the teacher unions showed up and started screwing everything up?

And yet we continue to allow the unions to jam the "more $ = better quality" mentality down our throats. I'd love to see a comparison of the test results of public school students to private school students. Amazingly - private school teachers get paid far less than those in the public sector and somehow typically produce far better results. Part of that, I would have to admit, is probably the result of smaller class sizes in the private schools - but do you think we might actually be able to achieve that in the public sector if we weren't being held hostage by unreasonable pay/benfits demands every contract term? And if parents actually insisted on respect for teachers in the classroom?

Glad to see our high property taxes and enormous spending on schools is paying off. Perhaps the teachers can spend less time griping about their pay and benefits and more time teaching.

I am not surprised that the scores are so low, after all Johnny and Jane CANNOT READ!!!

I refuse to give credit to the school department for my son's excellence in English. When he first expressed an interest in reading I taught him the fundamentals of phonetically sounding out and spelling words , the way I was taught back in the 1960s. (Their method was to let them spell it the way they thought and then try to correct it after the fact.) My son has been reading since kindergarten (BEFORE the schools got their hands on him) and has not stopped since. He was in honors and advanced classes throughout high school and took advanced placement exams, scoring a 5/5 in English and is now attending a very highly ranked university.

It is high time that we go back to teaching the basics in the first and second grades and MAKE SURE the children have a firm grasp on this before they advance. There is nothing wrong with detaining a student for an extra year at this level of education to give them any additional time they may need. Without mastering the basic reading and spelling skills there is no way they can advance and keep up with those that have as most of the other subjects are based on a firm understanding of basic English language.

As soon as parents and politicians stop interfering with teachers doing their jobs, allow them to teach, discipline, and hold students accountable for both their actions and inactions, test scores and overall performances will rise. Not convinced? Ask a teacher about "advisory," to pick one salient and recent example, or about parental pressure to dilute performance and discipline standards, and you'll get another perspective other than "It's the unions' fault."

Dave education unions constantly fight for smaller class size. It's the bean counter mentality of certain school committee members who sometimes no squat about education that are making the call. Also these tests are a bunch of B.S. !! Let teachers teach our children instead of administer tests.

I love the Rhode Island "Slam the Teacher" mentality as seen by the initial feedbacks. Has anybody thought about the type of student that enters schools- with all of the poverty, home, financial, social, and parenting (or lack there of) issues??? We should be appreciative with the results we receive and celebrate the accomplishments made by our districts. Walk a mile in a teacher shoes and then see if you think they are overpaid. The test results need to go up and there is no arguing that. But think about what others (parents) can do to better support our teachers instead of pointing fingers. Let's work together instead of placing blame!!!

Gee with one of THE highest tax rates in the country, surely our union bred teachers should be able to do better than this! What a disgrace. The taxpayers are at the brink and the teachers are just cruising on auto-pilot with no accountability. This state is a joke.

My kids went to Cedar Hill Elementary. Principal at Cedar Hills always talks about(images) his school is the best. My kids are not challenged in Cedar Hills. When a principal does not want to find out the weakness in his school, how can he improves his school? It is sad that when you see a principal from a good RI elemetary school acting like that. RI education systems will never improve when the principals always images his school is the best in the nation. This is the fault of the school board. School board should set the standard to challenge the principal. One of the fine examples from the state we came from is that all the students must take a national standarized tests every 6 months. If the student does not make 6 months and above progress during these tests every 6 month, it impacts principal and teacher's perform. RI school system should challenge the principals, challenge the teachers, then they will challenge the students.

Many of our students come from families where education is not the primary element for success. With parents/guardians sometimes working two jobs each, they are not home at critical times for student homework and guidance. It is not the #1 point in many families to actually spend time reading with our youth and actually modeling good practices (away from the television and computer games) so that reading of any kind (novels, short stories, newspapers, magazines, etc) are seen as good choices. Of course kids and adults are happy to read those "cheat guides" for computers - and although that is reading, it is not the kind of reading that is tested in the tests mentioned in this article. You can't blame the teachers for this one. I teach two classes of 12th grade Academic English, two classes of a regular, everyday Grade 12 English and one Low Level Grade 12 English class to students in a school where we are forced to have No Child Left Behind, and yet students come from countries where they have never seen a printed word until they reach the US, sometimes at the age of 18. This is a problem that is not only seen in Rhode Island. All kids take these tests and this includes ELL students, special ed students, etc. l would love to see how these test results are divided between towns. My guess is those schools where many students are the children of lawyers, doctors, professors, etc. (such as East Greenwich and North Kingstown) tested well. Schools in districts with lower median wage earners are probably where the lower scores are occurring. Instead of badmouthing teachers who work very hard for their pay, and complaining about what teachers get for salary and benefits, consider this: maybe the problem begins at home and maybe you should remember back in the days (before unions?) that students did not have as many distractions then as they do now - computers, video games, cell phones, tv's - and perhaps more parental controls on these types of privileges would assist our students in gaining those skills necessary for success.