The Civic Committee has been tracking the academic performance of public schools in Chicago and the six-county, Chicagoland region since the introduction of statewide, standards-based testing in 1999. On July 29, 2003, the Civic Committee issued its findings in a 104-page report entitled, Left Behind.

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Left Behind includes detailed analysis of the 2002 Illinois Standards Achievement Tests (ISATs) taken by elementary students, as well as results of the Prairie State Achievement Exams (PSAEs) taken by 11th graders. It provides comparisons of student performance in Chicago and the six-county area after controlling for ethnicity, family-income and low-income concentrations. For Chicago schools, the study also includes a school-by-school analysis of "adequate yearly progress" requirements adopted by the Illinois State Board of Education in June 2003 in response to federal No Child Left Behind legislation.

The report finds that the majority of students in the Chicago public schools are unprepared to meet ambitious, new state and federal education standards in reading, math and science. For example, nearly 40 percent of Chicago public school students drop out before they reach the 11th grade. Of the students who remain, approximately two-thirds of 11th graders fail to read at state standards, and about three-fourths fail to meet state standards in math or science.

Preliminary statewide test results for 2003 released in July are for Chicago schools as a whole - and do not show results for particular schools or for particular economic or ethnic categories of students. These overall preliminary 2003 results confirm the overall findings in Left Behind with respect to CPS performance. For the 11th grade, the reported percentage of CPS students meeting/exceeding state standards in reading dropped from 37% in 2002 to 36% in 2003; and the percentage meeting/exceeding standards in writing dropped from 35% to 34%. Math scores in 11th grade were flat (at 27%), and science scores increased one percentage point (to 24%).

Preliminary 2003 results for Chicago's 8th graders are more disappointing. They show a significant drop in the percentage of students meeting/exceeding state standards in reading - from 55% to 51% - and also in writing from 50% to 45%. Eighth grade math scores were flat - at 31% meeting/exceeding state standards.

Left Behind shows that CPS schools compare favorably with suburban schools in educating minority students, as well as non-minority students, holding ethnicity and family income levels constant. It also shows that some inner-city Chicago schools perform well above their peers in high-poverty neighborhoods. The report concludes that high-performing schools can become the norm in inner-city neighborhoods through creation of at least 100 public charter schools that increase parental choice and put meaningful competitive pressure on chronically failing neighborhood schools.