Oregon Public Broadcasting

Washington student test scores have hit a plateau. And it will take more money to achieve improvements in the future.

That's the message from state schools chief Randy Dorn. Friday he released results from this spring's round of standardized testing. Correspondent Austin Jenkins reports.

Overall WASL test scores are about the same as last year.

Eighty percent of 10th graders passed the reading and writing portions of the test. But math continues to bedevil Washington school kids, with just 45 percent of 10th graders making the grade.

Dorn says that's a huge problem because by 2013 students will have to pass the math test in order to graduate.

Randy Dorn: “Unless we get new resources, more one-on-one tutorial, more after-school - because it's going to take harder work and longer work with students. That's what it's going to take to get math down.”

The lack of progress in test scores means more than a thousand Washington schools are now on a federal No Child Left Behind watch list.

Dorn says the law is too punitive and needs to change. In the meantime, parents with kids in those failing schools will soon get a letter giving them a choice to move their child to another school.

This is the last year the WASL test will be given. Starting next year Washington students will take new, streamlined tests.