What results does NAEP provide?

Subject-matter achievement is reported in two ways-scale scores and achievement levels so that student performance can be more easily understood. NAEP scale score results provide a numeric summary of what students know and can do in a particular subject and are presented for groups and subgroups. Achievement levels categorize student achievement as Basic, Proficient, and Advanced, using ranges of performance established for each grade. (A fourth category, below Basic, is also reported for this scale.) Achievement levels are used to report results in terms of a set of standards for what students should know and be able to do.

NAEP provides results about subject-matter achievement, instructional experiences, and school environment and reports these results for populations of students (e.g., fourth-graders) and groups within those populations (e.g., male students or Hispanic students). NAEP does not provide individual scores for the students or schools assessed.

Because NAEP scales are developed independently for each subject, scale score and achievement level results cannot be compared across subjects. However, these reporting metrics greatly facilitate performance comparisons within a subject from year to year and from one group of students to another in the same grade.