CSAP Results: More than 80,000 students are substandard in reading, and the percent not catching up rose this year. Photo by Joe Mahoney/I-News

Thousands of Colorado school children are behind in math, reading, writing and science – and they might never catch up.

This week, I-News helped our media partners throughout Colorado tell the story.

I-News analyzed data from the Colorado Student Assessment Program for our media partners.The CSAP data are thousands of numbers that show how students in grades 3 through 10 perform in reading, writing, math and science. I-News boiled the numbers down, then shared them with our media partners statewide.

Here’s some of what we found:

Nearly 87 percent of Colorado public school students who fail to meet state education standards in math are not on pace to catch up, according to an I-News analysis of the latest standardized testing results.

More than 100,000 public school students in Colorado are not on track to become proficient in math or writing within three years, or by the time they reach the 10th grade.

More than 80,000 students are substandard in reading, and the percent not catching up rose this year.

Jo O’Brien, assistant commissioner of standards and assessments for the Colorado Department of Education, said the state is trying to develop new strategies to help students who can’t catch up.

“We’ve gone as far as we can go,” O’Brien said. “Students not scoring proficient can’t seem to rise and tend to stay behind through graduation. We believe the new business of education will be centered around the students who are in the catchup category.”

An I-News analysis of the state’s scores on how well schools are advancing students to meet the state standards found:

• 134,681 students, or 86.5% of those who scored unsatisfactory or partially proficient, were not on track to achieve proficiency in state standards in math within three years or by the time they reach the 10th grade. Last year, 87% were not on pace to achieve proficiency.

• 122,853 students, or 72% of those not meeting state writing standards, were not on pace to catch up. Despite the high numbers, it was an improvement over last year when 76% were not on track to reach writing proficiency.

• 80,999 students, or 71% of deficient students in reading, were not on pace to reach proficiency. That was an increase from 65% last year.

Four of every five school districts in the state (81 percent) made gains in the portion of their students who scored proficient at meeting state reading standards between 1997 and 2011. But those gains have stalled in the past five years. (Photo by Joe Mahoney/I-News)

More Colorado public school children are meeting state education standards for reading than they were 15 years ago, but fewer are excelling at the subject, an I-News Network analysis of new school testing scores shows.

State education officials today (Aug. 3) released scores for the standardized Colorado Student Assessment Program tests – known as CSAPs – which showed the portion of fourth graders in state public schools who meet or surpass state reading requirements has risen 10 percentage points since testing began a decade and a half ago.

An I-News analysis of those data show the gains appear to have stalled recently, though.

Most reading gains came in the first decade of testing, the analysis shows. And most school districts, including some of the largest, have actually seen their students’ reading scores drop since 2006.

This marks the fifteenth year Colorado has tested fourth grade reading and writing in its public schools. The state is revamping its testing program next year.

The I-News Network analyzed 15 years of data and found:

• More students meet reading standards. Four of every five school districts in the state (81 percent) made gains in the portion of their students who scored proficient at meeting state reading standards between 1997 and 2011.

• Advanced reading scores suffered. Nearly two of every three districts (64 percent) saw an actual drop in the portion of children scoring advanced in reading since CSAPs began.

• Reading gains are stalled. Almost all the reading gains came in the first 10 years of testing, with most districts either stagnating or falling slightly since 2006.

The portion of fourth graders scoring advanced in reading fell or stagnated in about 80 percent of the districts, or four out of every five. Some of the biggest drops were posted by some of the highest scoring districts. Academy 20 in El Paso County saw a 4 percentage point fall, Cherry Creek fell five percentage points, Littleton dropped three percentage points, Douglas County fell two percentage points, Poudre Valley in Larimer County fell two percentage points and Boulder Valley dropped one percentage point.

Denver was among the 20 percent of districts to show a gain in the portion of students scoring advanced in fourth grade reading, rising one percentage point over the 15 years.

One in three districts reduced the percent of students scoring “unsatisfactory” in reading.

State officials are most concerned with what they call “passing” scores: Combining both proficient and advanced. Statewide, the percent of students scoring either proficient or advanced in fourth grade reading has risen 10 percentage points in the past decade and a half, to 65 percent.

But since 2006, the portion of students with a passing fourth grade reading score has dropped three percentage points. Among the largest districts, these saw an overall decline in reading scores between 2006 and 2011: Douglas County, Colorado Springs, Greeley, Five Star in Adams County, St. Vrain, Boulder Valley, and Academy 20.

For fourth grade writing, the other test administered in all 15 years of the CSAPs, there also was a gap between gains in proficient scores and gains in advanced scores, though it was not as dramatic as the reading score gap. From 1997 to 2011, 89 percent of the districts showed gains in overall proficiency compared to 59 percent of the districts showing gains in the percent of students scoring advanced.

Districts also did much better in reducing the percent of students scoring unsatisfactory in writing, with 92 percent of the districts posting declines in unsatisfactory scores.

University of Colorado at Boulder

Officials at the University of Colorado know about a pattern of alleged date-rape drug use at a fraternity in Boulder, but say the law prevents them from naming the fraternity to police.

An investigation of sexual assault on college campuses found CU and others colleges across Colorado are withholding information about sexual assaults against students.

But the issue is more nuanced than first glance might suggest: Advocates say the secrecy is necessary to protect rape victims who wouldn’t come forward otherwise. Law enforcement officials say the secrecy may be allowing more people to fall victim.

This tension is emerging amid major changes in the way universities in Colorado try to prevent sexual assault, and how they publicly report crime on campus. And it matters to all of us because the effects of what some experts are calling an “epidemic” of assaults nationwide are long-lasting and costly to society.