ST. PAUL — Minnesota students showed some progress in reading on the state’s standardized tests and 11th-graders did even better on the math portion, but over half still weren’t considered proficient, the Minnesota Department of Education reported today.

The department reported that 74 percent of Minnesota students scored as proficient in reading on the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments last spring, an increase of 1.6 percent from the previous year. The biggest gains were in grades five through seven, where minority students showed more improvement on average than their white counterparts.

The number of 11th-graders who scored as proficient in math increased 5.3 percent from the previous year to 48.6 percent. However, the state’s academic achievement gap between white students and racial minorities remained. For example, 16 percent of black 11th graders made the grade while 55 percent of white juniors did.

It was difficult to calculate an overall math score for the state because students in grades three through eight took a test based on tough new standards for the first time. Those standards, which include the expectation that eighth-graders be proficient in algebra, were announced in 2007 and assessed for the first time this spring.

Education Commissioner Brenda Cassellius said that while the improvement in reading scores was welcome, it was lower than she had hoped.

“I wanted to see double-digit numbers,” she said.

She was more excited about the gain in math proficiency among 11th-graders, although she said she was still disappointed that more than half of the state’s high school juniors missed the benchmark for proficiency.

Read about results Thursday of schools in the Albert Lea area.