As Education Week reports on the nation’s report card in reading released today:
Reading scores stayed flat for 4th graders and rose only slightly for 8th graders on the most recent National Assessment of Educational Progress, results that some find disappointing after many years of intensive attention to improving the reading skills of American students. . . .
Eighth graders’ reading scores have hovered between 262 and 264 since 2002, and have risen 4 points overall since 1992, the year that marks the beginning of this series of reading exams. Fourth graders’ scores, also, have risen 4 points since 1992, and since 2002 have stayed within 2 points of the average 2009 scores.
Unfortunately, unlike reading scores, school spending has not stayed around 1992 rates–between 2001 and 2008, federal education spending jumped by 72 percent.
And still around 30 percent of kids remain proficient in reading.