As the school year gets rolling in West Virginia, teachers and administrators throughout the state are once again tackling a persistent problem — the drop in math proficiency from elementary school to middle school to high school.

Once again, West Virginia Department of Education data show a consistent decline in math proficiency as students get older. It’s a problem the Northern Panhandle is not immune to.

Department of Education information shows that, in Ohio County, 58% of fifth-graders were proficient in math last school year, which fell to 43% of eighth graders and 27% of 11th graders. In Marshall County, 37% of fifth-graders were proficient in math, which fell to 36% in eighth grade and 21% in 11th.

The rest of the panhandle is mostly the same in math proficiency:

– 58% of Hanco

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