According to the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress testing program, children who attend school on military bases do better academically than students who attend public schools. The test assess fourth and eighth graders in math and reading.

Thirty-two percent of fourth grade students who attend public schools had scores that show them as being proficient in reading. At the military schools, seven percent more (39 percent) students scored the same.

Another impressive finding showed that there is a smaller achievement gap between white and African American students in the military schools, and this gap is shrinking faster than the gaps at public schools.

So how are these military schools preparing their students so well? Is it extra test preparation?

“No,” said Leigh Anne Kapiko, the principal of Tarawa Terrace Elementary, a military school in Jacksonville, North Carolina. “That’s not done in Department of Defense schools. We don’t even have test prep materials.”

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