Illinois 2024 Report Card: How did schools perform in the 2023-24 school year?

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New data released today shows that Illinois students continue to recover from academic setbacks during the pandemic by most metrics, but SAT scores continue to decline.

Falling SAT scores reflect a national trend, but they come as more Illinois students graduate from public high schools, raising a red flag for the state’s top education officials.

The latest data from the Illinois State Board of Education reports show that the four-year high school graduation rate was 87.7% at the end of the 2023–2024 school year, up from 87.6% the previous year, and the rate has steadily increased over the past decade . decade. However, graduation rates for black and Latino students remain low compared to white and Asian American students.

About 31.1% of high school students who took the SAT last spring were considered proficient in reading, while 26.1% met or exceeded state standards in math. This is a decrease compared to 2018–2019, when 36.2% of students were proficient in reading and 34.4% were proficient in mathematics.

This spring, average composite SAT scores were 950.3, up from 960.9 last year and 994.5 in the 2018-19 school year.

State Superintendent Tony Sanders noted that, starting last year, Illinois’ accountability system has placed greater emphasis on graduation rates.

“Schools have really focused on improving graduation rates for all students, which has yielded significant results,” he said. “How can we achieve such incredible increases in graduation rates while decreasing high school proficiency levels?

Sanders and state education officials said at a news conference last week that the state is working on an individual growth index for students in grades nine through 11. The metric will not be part of the state’s accountability system for school districts and schools, but will be made available to high schools to help them understand where students are each year.

The report card provides insight into the performance of more than 850 school districts in Illinois. The massive data set includes information on hundreds of indicators such as test scores, enrollment data, chronic absenteeism, high school graduation rates, student participation in career and technical education programs, advanced placement enrollment, and teacher retention rates.

While the COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact students’ academic progress across the state, there are signs that Illinois students have regained ground on some indicators. Students in third through eighth grades are making progress on standardized state tests in reading and math, more students are taking advanced placement classes in high school, participation in career and technical education courses has increased, and the number of teachers in the state has increased since school started last year 2017-18.

After the pandemic, Illinois schools released almost $7 billion ON high impact tutoring AND employment increases. These funds ran out at the end of September.

Here are some highlights from the 2024 report.

Elementary students see pre-pandemic numbers in reading, but not in math

Third through eighth grade students who took the Illinois Assessment of Readiness, also known as IAR, in spring 2024 saw overall improvement in reading and math. In reading, 41.2% of students met or exceeded standards. This is by 5.8 percentage points. more than in spring 2023 and by 3.4 percentage points more than in 2019

Sanders attributed the improvement in reading skills to best practices in teaching, curriculum and professional development for teachers. He also mentioned the state comprehensive literacy plan.

However, students are struggling to reach pre-pandemic math levels. In 2024, approximately 28.4% of students were proficient in mathematics, which is approximately 3.4 percentage points lower than in 2019 and only 1.4 percentage points higher than in 2023.

Sanders said the state is working on a statewide math and numeracy plan to support students and increase their proficiency.

Racial disparities persist. White and Asian American students continue to achieve higher IAR math and reading proficiency rates than other student groups. Approximately 52.2% of white students were proficient in reading and 38.7% in math, while Asian American students were 68.2% proficient in reading and 61.3% in math.

Black and Latino students have seen slight improvement in scores since the 2018–19 school year, but IAR scores still lag behind white students and Asian American students, and students often perform below the state average. Approximately 28.6% of Latino students and 21.8% of Black students were proficient in reading, while 15.6% of Latino students and 9.1% of Black students were proficient in math.

Earlier this month Chicago Public Schools announced that approximately 30.5% of students in third through eighth grades demonstrated proficiency in reading on the spring 2024 Illinois Assessment of Readiness, and 18.3% met or exceeded standards in math.

The number of people learning English is constantly growing

Approximately 1.8 million students attended Illinois public schools in the 2023–24 school year, the same year as the 2022–23 school year. In a call with reporters, Sanders said the overall decline in school enrollment began in 2015 and paralleled the nation’s declining birth rate.

However, Illinois continues to see an increase in the number of English language learners. In the 2023–24 school year, English language learners represented 16.4% of total student enrollment, an increase of 1.8 percentage points from the 2022–23 school year, when the enrollment rate was 14.6%. Sanders attributed the increase in new arrivals to families fleeing conflict around the world.

Overall student demographics are also changing, with an increase in the number of Asian, Latino and multiracial students and a decline in the number of white and black students enrolling in public schools

Absenteeism is lower but higher among preschoolers and high school students

When students miss 10% of the school year – approximately 18-20 school days – with or without an excuse, they are considered chronically absent. The percentage of students who missed that many classes increased during the Covid pandemic.

But the numbers dropped again. About 26.3% of all students were chronically absent in the 2023-2024 school year, up from 28.3% last year. In 2021-2022, Illinois saw its highest chronic absenteeism rate of 29.9%, when more students had to return to school in person.

This year, the Illinois State Board of Education decided to look at the connection between chronic absenteeism and grade level and found that kindergarten and high school students were most likely to be chronically absent.

Samantha Smylie is the state education reporter for Chalkbeat Chicago, covering school districts across the state, legislation, special education and the state board of education. Contact Samantha at [email protected].