The fourth graders in Jeremy Lowe’s class at Atlanta’s Parkside Elementary School are on a tight deadline. They have only five minutes to write a dramatic “warm-up play” with characters, a setting, dialogue and stage directions. They’re busily trying to fill up pages in their composition books.
After sharing their plays, they break into groups to work on different components of scene writing. The class seems to be more like a fun scene-writing workshop than a course covering a state reading requirement: understanding the elements of drama, prose and poetry. It’s also supposed to improve their literacy skills.
This exercise, and other initiatives like extra tutoring, appear to be working with fourth graders in Atlanta.
Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez
Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez
Atlanta Public Schools was the only large, urban school system in the U.S. that showed significant improvement in fourth grade math and reading scores on the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress, which was released late last month. The share of APS fourth graders performing at a ‘basic’ level or above in reading in 2024 increased by seven percentage points compared to 2022. The portion of students reaching that level in math improved by eight percentage points.
“I think it’s very encouraging,” Superintendent Bryan Johnson said in an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “The board and the team here — teachers, leaders — have done a tremendous job of beginning to lean into ‘the science of reading’ and obviously worked to try to remediate as much as possible during the pandemic and respond. And so I think it’s … an opportunity for us to build and to continue to move (the) work forward.”
State lawmakers passed legislation in 2024 requiring school districts to implement literacy practices aligned to a body of research called “the science of reading.” It has been described as an intensive phonics program, but includes several components of reading instruction, including vocabulary development, fluency and comprehension.
Some metro Atlanta districts, including APS, were already heading in that direction.
Atlanta launched a pilot program at eight elementary schools that centered on “the science of reading” and expanded the program to all elementary schools this school year. The district has invested about $12 million toward the initiative.
Atlanta Board of Education Chair Erika Mitchell, who co-authored the board’s first literacy policy, credits former interim Superintendent Danielle Battle with prioritizing literacy when she took over in September 2023.
“At that time the literacy policy was adopted, the district received the direction and what we needed to do as far as focus(ing) on literacy and that focus happened,” she said.
The National Assessment of Educational Progress results also showed what Johnson calls “opportunities” for APS. Eighth grade reading scores were flat, but the percentage of eighth graders scoring at a “basic” level or better in math fell by seven percentage points. The district also followed a trend seen across the country, where students in the higher percentiles generally improved their scores, while those in the lower percentiles saw their scores drop.
Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez
Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez
“I think the biggest opportunity for Atlanta public schools continues to be … our students that are economically disadvantaged, our Black students, our students with disabilities, our English learners. Those subgroups are where you see, in large part, the most significant decline,” he said.
Johnson, who was hired as superintendent in July, said the district will expand “the science of reading” through its middle schools, will continue to provide interventions for students who are struggling academically and will provide training for teachers to address the disparities.
Officials with the National Center for Educational Statistics, which administers National Assessment of Educational Progress, said rates of chronic absenteeism have increased since the COVID-19 pandemic, which could explain why overall scores were flat from 2022 to 2024 and haven’t rebounded to 2019 levels.
APS is one of many districts across the U.S. that has tried to combat chronic absenteeism.
Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez
Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez
Timmy Foster, the principal at Parkside Elementary, said students living in poverty often have a harder time in school. About 48% of Parkside’s students are considered “economically disadvantaged,” according to state data.
Foster said those students need access to preschool so they’re ready for kindergarten.
“I think something has to happen between birth and 3 years old that the public schools don’t necessarily do,” Foster said. “Until we really get that group of students … the experience and the exposure that they need prior to entering into the school, I think that that gap (between higher- and lower-achieving students) will always kind of be there.”
What is NAEP?
The National Assessment of Educational Progress is administered every two years by the National Center for Education Statistics. The test is issued to a random sample of students in each state in subjects including math, reading, science and writing.
It’s referred to as “The Nation’s Report Card” because the results can be compared across different regions and demographic groups. Students’ results are divided into one of three categories: basic, proficient or advanced. The 2024 scores included results for fourth and eighth graders.
The results are typically broken down by states, but APS scores are included because the school system participates in a program called Trial Urban District Assessment, which focuses on achievement in 26 urban U.S. school districts.
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