Alabama 3rd grade reading scores improve in many districts

Some Alabama school districts made big gains on the state’s third grade reading test, even as expectations grew tougher.

Under the Alabama Literacy Act, third graders are required to demonstrate they can read well enough to advance to fourth grade. This is the second year the retention requirement will be enforced but it’s the first time students had to meet a new, higher benchmark score to be considered reading sufficiently.

RELATED: Check out more Alabama news.

Subscribe to The Alabama Baptist today!

The state’s board of education raised the benchmark, or cut score, in October as part of a plan to raise expectations over time.

Statewide, 88.4% of third graders met the benchmark score of 444 on the spring reading test. To allow a fair comparison, the Alabama Department of Education recalculated last year’s results using this year’s higher benchmark: 86.3% of students would have met that score if it had been applied then.

The third-grade reading test is a key accountability measure in the Literacy Act, first passed in 2019.

Third graders who didn’t meet the benchmark are invited to summer reading camps. Districts are required to offer the camps, taught by strong reading teachers and designed to be engaging — not just academic drills. However, students aren’t required to participate, which has negatively impacted daily attendance.

What do district-level results show?

Alabama Daily News analyzed the district-level data, released June 12, to find the bright spots and emerging trends.

Reading scores in most districts differed only by a few percentage points up or down though a handful tumbled backwards.

The higher score didn’t appear to be a barrier for nearly three dozen school districts that met or exceeded last year’s numbers. Despite the cut score change, several districts — including those serving large populations of students in poverty — saw strong results.

Gains

Four districts in the Black Belt region and two charter schools stood out for their gains from last year to this year. Even with the higher cut score, each had the following percentage-point gains:

• Covenant Academy of Mobile (charter) — 12.5 point gain, 93% at or above benchmark
• Lowndes County — 7.6 point gain, 90% at or above benchmark
• Bullock County — 7.5 point gain, 85% at or above benchmark
• LEAD Academy (charter) — 7.5 point gain, 84% at or above benchmark
• Wilcox County — 7.3 point gain, 96% at or above benchmark
• Selma City —  5.8 point gain, 90% at or above benchmark

Not all districts saw progress. Sumter County’s scores dropped from 81% last year to 66% this year. Montgomery County fell from 82% to 76%, and Bessemer City schools saw a 17-point decline — from 85% down to 68%.

The table below shows each district’s percentage of third graders that reached that year’s benchmark score, along with the poverty rate for the 2024–25 school year.

Full story.

EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by Trisha Powell Crain and originally published by Alabama Daily News.