California Reading Report Card:

As in the 2019 Report Card, funding and share of high-need students had very little correlation with results. There are top performing districts with over 90% high-need enrollment, and low performing districts with less than 40%.

The clear message is that it is not the students themselves, or the level of resources, that drive student reading achievement – the primary drivers are district focus on reading, management practices, and curriculum and instruction choices. The top performing districts come in all types: urban, rural, and suburban, across 9 different counties, with high-need students levels ranging from 39% to 94%. Any district can succeed at teaching reading.

New this year is a break-down by percent of limited-proficiency English Learners (ELs). With ELs, districts are tasked with teaching both English and reading; short-comings in either will yield low results. Districts with higher shares of ELs may have lower results, but still out-perform many districts with a similar student mix by as much as 25 percentage points.

A very small number of districts (7 in total) bucked the pandemic-driven trend. Palo Alto Unified, one of 2019 lowest performers, improved by 9 percentage points, and was the state’s most improved district. Their Every Student Reads Initiative, started in 2021, appears to be having positive impact. Newark Unified improved by 5 percentage points.

How the Rankings Work

Districts are ranked by the percent of economically disadvantaged Hispanic/Latino (Latino) students who “meet or exceed” grade level for the CAASPP 3rd grade ELA test in 2022. For measuring improvement, we compared to the same results for 2019.

More, here.

“Well, it’s kind of too bad that we’ve got the smartest people at our universities, and yet we have to create a law to tell them how to teach.”

The data clearly indicate that being able to read is not a requirement for graduation at (Madison) East, especially if you are black or Hispanic”

My Question to Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers on Teacher Mulligans and our Disastrous Reading Results

2017: West High Reading Interventionist Teacher’s Remarks to the School Board on Madison’s Disastrous Reading Results 

Madison’s taxpayer supported K-12 school district, despite spending far more than most, has long tolerated disastrous reading results.

“An emphasis on adult employment”

Wisconsin Public Policy Forum Madison School District Report[PDF]

WEAC: $1.57 million for Four Wisconsin Senators

Friday Afternoon Veto: Governor Evers Rejects AB446/SB454; an effort to address our long term, disastrous reading results

Booked, but can’t read (Madison): functional literacy, National citizenship and the new face of Dred Scott in the age of mass incarceration.

No When A Stands for Average: Students at the UW-Madison School of Education Receive Sky-High Grades. How Smart is That?