The AP report describes a “reading recession” that predates the pandemic and points to uneven progress across the country as states and districts adjust how schools teach literacy and help children who are struggling to read. While national reading scores remain weak, the report says math results look brighter in many places and some districts show reading improvements alongside changes to instruction and student support.
The scorecard analysis, which examined state test results in third through eighth grades for more than 5,000 school districts across 38 states, found that only five states and the District of Columbia recorded meaningful reading growth between 2022 and 2025. Overall, researchers said students remained nearly half a grade level behind pre-pandemic reading scores, even as the nation focused on catching students up after COVID-19 disruptions.
The report also places the reading problem in a longer timeline. It says reading test scores have been falling since 2013 for eighth graders and since 2015 for fourth graders, citing the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Thomas Kane, a Harvard professor who helped create the Education Scorecard, characterized the pandemic as following earlier, steady declines, saying: “The pandemic was the mudslide that had followed seven years of steady erosion in achievement.”
The AP report contrasts the reading trend with math. It says researchers found improvements in math test scores in almost every state from 2022 to 2025 and that absenteeism declined in most states. In more than 400 districts, including Modesto, the report says reading or math growth outpaced demographically similar districts in the same state.
On potential causes of the reading recession, the report says researchers have debated multiple explanations. One factor researchers raised is the rise of social media on smartphones and corresponding declines in children’s recreational reading. The report also notes that Kane said states have backed off on strict consequences for schools whose students fail to show progress on standardized tests.
In the report’s account of what correlates with better reading outcomes, states that improved reading scores—including Louisiana, Maryland, Tennessee, Kentucky and Indiana—shared a shift toward phonics-based instruction promoted as the “science of reading.” The AP report says schools had previously taught reading in ways that de-emphasized phonics and encouraged strategies such as guessing words from context clues, and that parents, scholars and literacy advocates pushed for instruction aligned with decades of research on how children learn to read.
The report says states also added screening and coaching supports. It describes “science of reading” reforms that include requiring schools to screen for learning disabilities such as dyslexia and hiring coaches to help teachers improve reading instruction. However, it also says the AP found that phonics-based efforts did not automatically stop reading declines everywhere, noting that states including Florida, Arizona and Nebraska changed parts of their reading instruction but still saw test scores fall.
Modesto, California, appears in the report as one district where reading and math results improved. It says Modesto revamped reading instruction during the pandemic and had updated math instruction a couple years earlier, and that the district created a new department to support students learning English. The report also says schools increased teacher training, including paying educators $5,000 to complete an extensive “science of reading” program called LETRS, or Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling. It says Modesto’s test scores grew enough to represent an extra 18 weeks of learning in math and 13 weeks in reading, while also describing overall performance as still far below grade level.
The report also describes reforms and attendance work in Detroit, where student outcomes improved alongside efforts to keep children in school more consistently. It says Detroit faced conditions that led to a 2016 lawsuit in which students argued they had been denied the “right to read,” and that the case ended in a settlement of over $94 million. It says the funds helped Detroit move faster than similar urban districts in Michigan while still leaving the district below the national average.
In Detroit, the report highlights added staffing and attendance outreach at specific schools. It says Munger Elementary-Middle School, in a largely Latino neighborhood, employed 18 educators for small-group support and used an attendance agent that calls absent students’ homes and sometimes shows up at their doors. First grade teacher Samantha Ciaffone said the approach changed daily attendance: “It allows us to be better educators to see kids consistently in the seat instead of once or twice a week,” adding, “It makes such a difference.”
The AP report says progress is particularly visible in parts of the South, where states have moved earlier toward research-based teaching methods and paid to train and coach teachers. It says Louisiana and Alabama were the only states where math scores were higher in 2025 than pre-pandemic, and that Louisiana was also the only state that beat its pre-pandemic reading average, with 87% of traditional public school students attending districts with scores higher than in 2019. It also describes Alabama’s post-pandemic reading gains as driven by a state law requiring phonics-based instruction and says math reforms were modeled in part after the state’s reading efforts, including a 2022 Numeracy Act that standardized math instruction, required regular testing and mandated intervention for students lacking adequate math skills.
The report includes an on-the-ground look at instruction in Modesto’s Fairview Elementary. It says teacher Nancy Barajas uses a “pre-celebration” routine—dimming lights, turning on a disco ball, and playing music—before exams, and describes classroom reading routines where students practice reading speed and fluency together, including pairing English learners with native English speakers. It also quotes a student describing reading practice: “Eventually, you get through the word like it’s water,” and “You just say it smooth.”
Researchers cited in the report say such improvements are possible across the U.S. by pointing to earlier decades of rising test scores and graduation rates followed by reduced racial disparities in the mid-2010s. Stanford professor Sean Reardon said: “We made enormous progress as a country in terms of educational success from over a 30-year period. Test scores went up dramatically,” adding: “And so I think that says, as a country, we can improve education and educational opportunity.”