PHOENIX — The first ever state ranking of charter school student performance on a national assessment test has been released, and Arizona charter school students appear to be below the national average.
The data from Education Next shows Arizona charter school students scored 11.5% below the national average on the National Assessment of Educational Progress test from 2009-2019.
That puts Arizona's rank at 39th out of the 50 states plus D.C.
A bright spot for Arizona in the rankings is the difference in scores between white and Black charter students.
Arizona had the second-lowest difference in scores between white and Black charter students.
Nonetheless, the report says that there is a 2.5-year learning deficit in Arizona among Black charter students to their white counterparts.
The report comes after an ABC15 report brought scrutiny to Arizona's Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program.
The program helps families send kids to schools of their choosing, but our Investigators found money going towards expenses such as new pianos and SnowBowl passes.