Adequate funding for early literacy efforts will be one of our education priorities for the 2016 legislative session.
Iowa’s 2012 Education Reform legislation focused in part on ensuring all students become good readers. For the last three years, the state has provided $8 million per year to achieve that goal. Funding has gone primarily to helping students in their early elementary years so that they read at grade level by the time they complete third grade.
However, assessments show that between 22 percent and 30 percent of Iowa third-graders last school year failed local reading tests. Starting next year, any student who is substantially deficient in reading at the end of third grade will have to take a summer reading program or repeat third grade.
The Iowa Department of Education is asking for $9 million specifically for summer school, and another $5.5 million to step up literacy efforts throughout the state. Unfortunately, Governor Branstad’s budget does not call for funding these critical requests, even though he wants to hold kids back if their reading isn’t on par by the end of third grade.
We need to support local schools and summer reading programs as a viable and preferable alternative to holding students back.