The percentage of black and lower-income students passing New Jersey's major state high school test is rising even as progress has largely stagnated for white, Asian and higher-income students.

State Education Department officials welcome the improvement but say it doesn't show that the state's achievement gap is narrowing much.

They say that white, Asian and non-economically disadvantaged students are not improving as much mostly because they already pass the High School Proficiency Assessment at such a high rate.

The state released results of last year's standardized tests for high school students and younger children on Wednesday. There was not much movement on test scores for children in third to eighth grade.

Assessment results can be found here.

(Copyright 2012 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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