The purposes of this study were to: (1) assess the present level of scientific literacy of students in twelve public school systems in Georgia on an abbreviated form of the "National Assessment of Educational Progress Science Test"; (2) compare the performance of these students on specific test items with the performance of equivalent-grade students used in the test standardization; and (3) determine the relationship of certain demographic variables (gender, race, size of school system, and geographic location of school system) on the acquisition of scientific literacy. The present level of scientific literacy of the Georgia sample was determined to be below the mastery criterion of 70% accuracy for all three grade levels tested. In comparison of the Georgia sample with the national sample on selected science items, the scores of the Georgia sample were significantly different from the national sample of 60% of the items. Results also indicated significant differences for sex, race, school system size at all three grade levels, and for geographic location of the school system at the fourth- and eighth-grade levels. (Author/JN)