The write stuff

Illinois eighth-graders are doing well when it comes to scoring on the national writing tests. The average score for Illinois public school students was 160, compared to a national average of 154 on the National Assessment of Education Progress, one of the few such assessments given across the country. New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts students did best on the test, while Illinois fell into a broad swath just below that. Matt Vanover of the Illinois Board of Education says the test results are good news for Illinois, especially when they are compared to other big states. The writing test was administered in 2007 to a sampling of students including 139,900 eighth-graders and 27,900 12th-graders. In Illinois, students at 199 public and private schools were tested.