About the Trial Urban District Assessment in reading

Eleven urban districts participated in the 2007 Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) in reading at grades 4 and 8. See a table summarizing the demographic characteristics of each district at grade 4 and grade 8. Participating districts included the following:

The NAEP Trial Urban District Assessments are designed to explore the feasibility of using NAEP to measure performance of public school students at the district level on a common scale. The assessment was administered in both reading and mathematics in 2007. About 22,600 students in almost 790 schools were sampled at grade 4, and about 18,600 students in over 560 schools were sampled at grade 8.

Only public school students participated in the 2007 TUDA assessments, so throughout this website, scores are compared to public school averages for the nation and large central cities. Large central cities (cities with a population of 250,000 or more) provide a comparison that is more reflective of these student populations.

The NAEP reading assessment presents a comprehensive view of what students in the United States know and can do in the area of reading. In addition to district-level results, results are reported at the national and state level at grades 4 and 8.

The reading assessment was developed and reviewed by a committee of reading and measurement experts to capture the goals of the 2007 reading framework. The National Assessment Governing Board, through a comprehensive national process involving reading teachers, researchers, measurement experts, policymakers, and members of the general public, created the framework, which describes the goals of the assessment and the kinds of exercises it ought to feature. The Reading Development Committee was instrumental in the development of the assessment.

Learn more about the 2007 reading assessment.

• Learn what the reading assessment measures.
• Read more about how the assessment was developed, including information about the process used to score constructed-response questions.
• Read about the NAEP reading scale on the NAEP website.
• Learn more about the sampling design.
• Read about how to interpret NAEP reading results.