By Kristina Torres / The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Atlanta elementary and middle school students have made double-digit math gains since 2003, but they still trail their peers from the nation’s big cities.

A report released Tuesday analyzing certain math scores in 18 urban school systems showed that Atlanta’s students this year scored in the middle of the pack but below public school students in big cities overall.

On the National Assessment of Educational Progress -- also known as NAEP and the Nation's Report Card -- 45 percent of Atlanta's eighth-graders scored at basic proficiency or better, compared with 59 percent of big-city students nationally.

Spotted here