California’s investment in literacy instruction appears to be paying off, though state officials and education researchers say there’s still room for improvement — particularly for rural and smaller school districts struggling to find qualified literacy coaches.
Since 2013, before California overhauled how reading is taught in its elementary and middle schools, the state ranked 47th nationally in fourth-grade reading proficiency on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, often called the Nation’s Report Card. At the time, just 27% of California students scored “proficient” or “advanced” on the exam, which is administered every two years to students across the country.
The following year, the state adopted a new curriculum framework for English language arts that pushed schools toward phonics-based instruction, alongside stronger vocabulary teaching and other foundational reading strategies. Phonics instruction won’t be mandatory statewide until next year, but most districts have already begun incorporating it.
Since then, the state has rolled out new curriculum materials, a dyslexia screening tool, and updated requirements for teacher credentialing programs. Officials also expanded transitional kindergarten and introduced new guidelines for supporting English learners.
Perhaps the most significant investment came in 2023, when the state distributed $500 million in grants to help schools hire literacy coaches and take other steps to strengthen reading instruction. These coaches — typically former teachers with specialized training in reading — work directly with classroom teachers to sharpen how they teach children to read. Last year, the state added $215 million more to the effort, and the most recent state budget includes an additional $350 million for literacy coaching.
The approach echoes what happened in Mississippi, a state that leapt from 49th in the nation in fourth-grade reading in 2013 to 9th place by 2024. Mississippi credits much of that turnaround to literacy coaches and intensive teacher training. While California’s reading framework closely resembles Mississippi’s, the Southern state moved much faster and more aggressively to train teachers, whereas California has phased in its rollout over several years.
Reading scores creep upward
California’s reading scores have improved steadily, if modestly, since 2013. Last year, the state landed roughly in the middle of the pack nationally, with 13 states outperforming California and the rest scoring the same or lower — a shift that also reflects declining reading scores nationwide.
On state assessments, the share of fourth graders reading at grade level rose from 40% in 2014 to 46% last year. Scores had approached 50% before the pandemic, dipped when schools shifted to remote learning, and have been gradually climbing back since.
Fourth grade is considered a critical benchmark in literacy development, since by fifth grade students need solid reading skills to keep pace in subjects like history and science. Children who aren’t reading fluently by fourth grade are more likely to struggle academically in other areas. Research has also linked weak literacy skills in adulthood to higher rates of unemployment and incarceration, among other challenges.
Sarah Novicoff, a researcher with the Public Policy Institute of California, recently studied the state’s literacy investments and found they’ve made a real difference — with one important caveat.
“They’ve clearly had a positive impact,” Novicoff said. “But there’s an opportunity to do even better.”
Novicoff found that nearly 60% of school districts used their grant funding to hire literacy coaches to support teachers, reading specialists to work directly with students, or otherwise expand literacy-focused professional development.
Districts that made those investments saw measurable gains in reading scores, including among English learners, her research found. While results varied from district to district, students overall scored about six points higher on state tests within two years of the investment being made. Novicoff expects those gains to keep growing over time.
Rural districts struggle to find coaches
Not every district was able to hire a literacy coach — not for lack of interest, but for lack of available candidates. Novicoff’s research found that 42% of districts reported difficulty filling these positions.
“I would love to hire a literacy coach,” said Patricia Gunderson, superintendent of the Lassen County Office of Education. “It’s great that the state is offering the funding, but we simply can’t do it. We don’t have the capacity.”
In California’s rural and remote regions, finding qualified literacy coaches has proven nearly impossible, Novicoff found, which has slowed progress in those areas. In Lassen County, near the Nevada border, districts already struggle to find enough credentialed teachers, let alone educators with advanced specialized degrees. Even if schools could hire coaches, there aren’t enough substitute teachers available to cover classrooms while teachers attend training.
Still, Lassen County has found creative workarounds. In 2023, the county organized a weeklong summer training program, paying teachers to learn the new curriculum without disrupting the school year. Gunderson said the effort paid off — state reading scores rose more than 7 percentage points, though they remain below the state average.
In Siskiyou County, along the Oregon border, county superintendent Allan Carver said he welcomes the state’s investment in literacy coaching, but it’s created an unintended side effect: teachers are leaving classrooms to become literacy coaches, possibly drawn by less stressful work or slightly higher pay, leaving teaching vacancies behind.
“We’re trying to solve one problem and, in the process, making the teacher shortage worse,” Carver said. “We need a comprehensive plan for training literacy coaches before we simply hand out funding and set expectations for training.”
In Baldwin Park, in the San Gabriel Valley, Principal Laura Rodriguez said literacy coaching has been a turning point for her school’s reading outcomes. Using a state grant, Tracy Elementary School hired a literacy coach who works closely with teachers, instructional aides and the school’s reading specialist.
The coach, Claudia Barba, leads workshops for teachers and parents, trains aides, assesses students, reviews data and provides feedback to classroom teachers. She also developed a literacy plan that closely examines the root causes behind low reading scores and targets them directly.
“It’s amazing,” Rodriguez said. “I’ve seen a huge difference since we started this. It’s transformed our campus.”
Tracy Elementary, a dual-language immersion program in Spanish and English, primarily serves low-income students, more than 30% of whom are English learners. The school’s literacy plan teaches children to read first in Spanish, then in English, emphasizing vocabulary and phonics in both languages. By third grade — when the state begins administering reading assessments — students are already reading fluently in both languages.
Just two years after hiring its literacy coach, Tracy’s reading scores climbed more than 10 percentage points, with English learners showing significant gains as well. Other measures of school success have improved too: chronic absenteeism dropped from 44% shortly after the pandemic to 11% last year, and math scores are trending upward as well.
“Literacy is the key to everything. If a child can read, they can access knowledge. They start to enjoy school,” Rodriguez said. “They can get a better education.”
Original source: CalMatters
