While Illinois students are improving overall on state standardized tests, more school districts are failing to meet federal requirements that get tougher every year.

Today, the Illinois State Board of Education is releasing data for its state standardized tests, called the Illinois Standards Achievement Test.

Increases were generally less than 1 percent, with the highest gains in sixth grade math and eighth grade reading.

But far more schools failed to make federal expectations under the No Child Left Behind Act. Those federal standards rise each year, with nearly two-thirds of students now expected to pass state exams. This year, 40 percent of schools in Illinois failed to meet the federal benchmark, up from 31 percent last year.

Illinois schools Superintendent Chris Koch said the federal standards are now penalizing even those districts that are making gains in student performance.

"It doesn't mean that schools aren't improving, it just means that they aren't proficient," he said. "No Child Left Behind doesn't measure student learning and that's a flaw in the law."

Still, many schools in Illinois that had once fallen short of the federal standards are now meeting them.

More than 40 schools and districts statewide are being removed from "improvement status" lists because they have made federal expectations for two years in a row. In the Metro East area, that includes East Alton Middle School in Madison County and Whiteside Middle School in St. Clair County.

Wood River-Hartford School District in Madison County is one of nine school districts statewide that made federal expectations after failing to do so last year but is still on an academic "improvement status" list. Roxana Junior High School, Emge Junior High School, and Lovejoy Middle school are among 53 schools statewide in the same situation.

When Whiteside Middle School found itself not meeting federal expectations two years ago, it stepped up efforts to improve, said principal Ron Trelow

Now, honors students from nearby Belleville East High School come twice a week to tutor students after school, all students take reading strategies and study skills classes, and the district has added more interactive white boards that connect to the teacher's computer and has changed how some of them teach, Trelow said.

"Every school has to have a school improvement plan, but some schools make a plan but don't follow it," he said. "Here it's been a real conscious effort."

Patrick Keeney, assistant principal of Roxana Junior High, said the school made many changes a few years ago, such as moving to block scheduling for English and math classes, making sure each student gets time with a reading teacher, and adding extra special education staff so each class is led by two teachers.

Jane Coaston of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this story.