Why does South Carolina have a higher percentage of schools not meeting AYP than most states?
Under No Child Left Behind, each state was allowed to set its own version of what “proficiency” means. Some states, including South Carolina, have proficiency standards that are much higher than other states. That’s why there is a wide disparity among states when it comes to the percentages of their schools that don’t meet AYP. For example, although South Carolina and Texas have similar performance levels on federal standardized tests, Texas had nearly 2½ times the percentage of its schools scoring proficient on its state tests. South Carolina set a high proficiency rate under the 1998 EAA state accountability system, a level that independent analysts recently rated along with Maine as the nation’s toughest. Texas set a lower standard, and so more of its schools meet AYP.
