Many of the states that claim to have large shares of their students reaching proficiency in reading and mathematics under the No Child Left Behind Act have set less stringent standards for meeting that threshold than lower-performing states, a new federal study finds. The study, "Mapping 2005 State Proficiency Standards Onto the NAEP Scales," drew an immediate and strong reaction from many public officials and education advocates, who said it laid bare states' vastly divergent standards for testing students. The report judges states' reading and math tests against a common yardstick: the proficiency standards used by the National Assessment of Educational Progress, often referred to as "the nation's report card." Released last week by the National Center for Education Statistics, the analysis appears to back up the suspicions of those who have cast a skeptical eye on state data showing high percentages of students reaching the "proficient" level in reading and math. However, researchers who were asked by the Council of Chief State School Officers to review the study's methodology cited what they see as flaws in comparing two dissimilar sets of exams. Even so, U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings called it "sobering news" as the nation seeks to raise academic demands on students.