When it comes to TAKS math scores, Texas faces a curious inequality.

Passing rates on the math test are much greater in elementary school than in middle or high school. Scores hit their lowest point in ninth grade, languish for a year and rebound on the 11th-grade exam, which students must pass to graduate.

That's the trend on the 2007 scores on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills. In fourth grade, 88 percent of North Texas students pass the math TAKS. Come ninth grade, only 68 percent pass the test. That rises to 83 percent in 11th grade.

The good news is that math scores (along with reading, writing, social studies and science) are mostly up from last year. But despite that improvement, the math slump persists.

Teachers say problems begin well before ninth grade. Many struggling students began having problems in elementary and middle school.

"Somewhere down there, they're not getting the skills they need," said Mary Strickland, a veteran math teacher at Kimball High School in west Oak Cliff. "When they get to us, they've missed a lot of skills, and they have to work really hard to come up to the ninth-grade level."

Even experts on math education don't have a definitive explanation, though they offer many theories. And they say it's a national problem that needs to be solved.

For starters, ninth-grade math – usually algebra – is significantly harder than what kids took in earlier grades. It builds on many skills, including multiplying fractions, solving word problems and graphing equations. If students haven't built a strong math foundation, those weaknesses get exposed.

Students' attitudes also change when they hit high school. No longer driven to please their teachers, some won't put forth the effort to pass the TAKS until 11th grade, when they must pass to graduate.

Another factor is that ninth grade often has a bulge of students held back a year – about one student in six, statewide – because they didn't earn enough credits to become sophomores. Those students often have much lower math scores.

Some math experts suggest that common American attitudes toward math play a role, too.

"It's socially acceptable to be mathematically ignorant. But no one brags about being illiterate," said Tom Loveless, a scholar at the Brookings Institution who sits on the National Mathematics Advisory Panel. The panel was created last year by President Bush to improve student achievement in math and American competitiveness.

No matter the reason, poor math ability has serious consequences beyond not knowing how to figure a 15 percent tip or balance a checkbook. Many students drop out in ninth grade, and academic frustration is one big reason. Students who succeed in algebra do better in high school and college.

"In elementary and middle school, [math] was one of my best subjects. I got to high school and it was one of my lowest ones," said Iris Cruz, who just finished her freshman year at Adamson High School in north Oak Cliff.

Iris, who passed the ninth-grade math TAKS, said she believes students would do better if they had more tutoring and one-on-one help from teachers. Students need to know math, she said, for skills like managing money and, someday, paying bills.

"It really hurts them in the long run," Ms. Strickland said. "If they don't get these subjects down pat the way they should, they're not going to be able to function in the workforce."

Students in grades three through 11 take the TAKS each spring. The results may not always matter to students, but they're closely watched by teachers, parents, principals and taxpayers. State school ratings are based largely on test scores.

This year's results reflect a historic trend: the strong link between student achievement and family income, across subjects and grade levels. Districts with greater proportions of poor students – many of whom are black or Hispanic – tend to have lower TAKS scores because of the academic challenges that poverty brings. Children who are learning English or are in special education also tend to struggle.

Although they get the most attention, test scores aren't the only gauge of student success. Nor can scores always be trusted. The Dallas Morning News has found instances of cheating on the TAKS in 2004, 2005 and 2006.

Math and reading are the only subjects tested in every grade, so it's easy to track progress, or lack thereof, from elementary school through graduation.

Reading scores fluctuate, but they don't take the same ninth-grade nose dive that math scores do.

Some local examples:

• Math scores plunged the deepest in the Lancaster school district, from 71 percent passing in fourth grade to just 32 percent in ninth grade. In Dallas, passing rates for those grades fell from 76 percent to 41 percent.

• Even higher-achieving districts, with few or no students held back in ninth grade, saw math performance tumble. McKinney's passing rates fell from 95 percent in fourth grade to 77 percent in ninth grade. In Allen, math scores sank in just a year, from 92 percent in eighth grade to 83 percent in ninth.

• Local schools also had similar drops in science, though it's tested only in grades five, eight, 10 and 11.

Ms. Strickland said she has taught ninth-graders with the math skills of a fourth-grader. It's not unusual for more than half of students who take Algebra I to fail.

She said the problems start in the lower grades.

Ms. Strickland noted that elementary school teachers aren't certified in specific subjects. Maybe they should be, so students could learn from teachers who specialize in math.

Freshmen also falter just because they're dealing with being freshmen.

"Ninth-graders are just coming into high school and they're trying so hard to fit in and be like the upperclassmen, so they're not focusing and trying to learn," Ms. Strickland said.

Michal Robertson, a veteran math teacher at North Garland High School, said high school students are generally fine with simple, one-step math problems. It's the ones requiring multiple steps or skills that trip students up.

"They start compartmentalizing things, and they're not always seeing that one part of math is tied to the other," Ms. Robertson said.

Some academics complain that even passing the TAKS tests doesn't guarantee success, particularly in college. The 11th-grade TAKS measures only Algebra I and geometry, not higher-level math.

"The TAKS standard is too low," said Larry Faulkner, the former president of the University of Texas at Austin who now heads the national math panel.

It's important and helps schools elevate their quality, he said, "but people shouldn't kid themselves that the passing standard on the TAKS is very competitive."

Remediation rates in college bear that out.

Seventy percent of high school graduates entering Dallas County's community colleges this fall will need remedial work, and mostly in math.

Many educators are looking forward to 2011, when the high school TAKS exams will start being replaced with a new set of tests tied to specific courses. Freshmen will take Algebra I, while sophomores take geometry and juniors take Algebra II. And TAKS scores will count toward students' final grades, prodding them to take the test more seriously.

Ken Helvey, Allen's superintendent, said he believes the new end-of-course tests should help reduce the drop in math and science scores in high school, because the tests will better mirror what students are taught.

"A TAKS math test may not correlate 100 percent to your course if you're teaching Algebra I," Dr. Helvey said, "but an end-of-course exam for Algebra I should correlate directly with what you're teaching."

Dr. Helvey said it's human nature for scores to increase in years when students must pass to advance a grade or graduate.

Still, teachers and experts say they'll continue to search for ways to boost math achievement.

"If I had answers," Ms. Robertson observed, "I'd be writing a book and making lots of money."

Staff writer Karen Ayres contributed to this report.