For years the standard answer to a child who struggled with reading was worry, wait, and see. California now has numbers that point somewhere better: 46% of the state’s fourth graders read at grade level, up from 40% in 2014, and new research ties the gains to districts that spent state grants on literacy coaches and on training teachers in evidence-based reading instruction. Notice what actually moved. The children did not change; the teaching did. That distinction matters for every parent who has watched a capable child battle a page and wondered what was wrong.
California’s reading scores are rising, and the gains follow a pattern every parent should understand: they showed up where schools changed how reading is taught. Here is what the numbers show and what the new K-2 screening rollout means for your family.
Common questions
What is California's new dyslexia screening requirement?
My child was flagged as at risk. Does that mean dyslexia?
What should I ask my child's school about reading instruction?
Are California's reading gains real?
California reading scores rose where state money changed how reading is taught, not where it was merely spent. The kids were always capable. The instruction finally caught up.
What the new numbers show
In 2013, California ranked 47th in the nation in fourth grade reading, with 27% of students scoring proficient or better on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. The state responded over the following decade: a 2014 English language arts framework that put phonics-based instruction back at the center, $500 million in grants for literacy coaches and reading support in 2023, another $215 million in 2024, and $350 million more in the current budget. Phonics-based instruction became mandatory in 2025, and a statewide dyslexia screening requirement is rolling out now. By 2025, 46% of fourth graders read at grade level on state tests, and California sits mid-pack nationally instead of near the bottom.
Research from the Public Policy Institute of California, reported July 20 by CalMatters, found that nearly 60% of districts used their grant money to hire literacy coaches, add reading specialists, or train teachers. Districts that made those moves saw students score roughly 6 points higher on state tests within two years, with gains extending to English learners. “They’ve absolutely had a positive impact. But we have an opportunity to do an even better job,” said PPIC researcher Sarah Novicoff.
Tracy Elementary in Baldwin Park shows what that looks like on the ground. The school serves mostly low-income families, with more than 30% English learners. After hiring literacy coach Claudia Barba, reading scores jumped more than 10 percentage points in two years, and chronic absenteeism fell from 44% to 11%. “Literacy is the key to everything. If a child can read, they can access knowledge. They start to enjoy school. They can get a better education,” said principal Laura Rodriguez.
They’ve absolutely had a positive impact. But we have an opportunity to do an even better job.
Laura Lurns · Learning Success expert
The gains followed the teaching, not the dollars
The easy headline is that spending worked. Look closer and the pattern is sharper: scores moved where the money changed how reading is taught, and stalled where it could not. Forty-two percent of districts reported trouble hiring literacy coaches, and remote counties saw little movement as a result. Meanwhile Lassen County sidestepped the hiring problem, paid teachers to attend one week of summer training in 2023, and watched reading scores climb more than 7 percentage points. Same dollars, different outcomes, one variable: whether instruction actually changed.
This is exactly what reading science predicts. Humans evolved to absorb spoken language, but reading is a cultural invention the brain never evolved for, which is why researchers from Stanislas Dehaene to Maryanne Wolf conclude it has to be explicitly taught. The National Reading Panel reached the same conclusion in 2000. Yet for decades many classrooms taught children to guess words from pictures and context, an approach Keith Rayner’s eye-movement research showed is how struggling readers read, not skilled ones; cognitive scientist Mark Seidenberg describes three-cueing as descriptive of how poor readers read. States only began correcting course after Emily Hanford’s 2019 investigation Sold a Story made the failure public.
Mississippi ran this experiment first. In 2013 it ranked 49th in fourth grade reading; by 2024 it ranked 9th, and a peer-reviewed causal study estimates its Literacy-Based Promotion Act raised average fourth grade NAEP reading scores by about 5 points. The recipe was the one now working in California: train teachers in the science of reading, put coaches beside them, and screen children early. Brain imaging from Yale and Stanford explains why it works: with the right intervention, children who struggle with reading develop the same reading pathways as typical readers. The brain physically rewires. The obstacle was never the children. It was instruction built on the myth that reading develops naturally.
Key takeaways
- Instruction moved the needle: Districts turning grants into coaches and teacher training gained 6 points in two years.
- Reading is taught, not caught: Decades of science show reading never develops naturally; explicit teaching rewires the brain.
- Screening reaches every K-2 child: California parents get advance notice, a written opt-out, and results within 45 days.
What this means for your child
If you have a child in a California elementary school, the screening piece arrives on your doorstep first. Starting with the 2025-26 school year, every kindergartner through second grader is screened annually for risk of reading difficulties under Senate Bill 114. You get written notice at least 15 days before the screening, the option to opt out in writing, and results within 45 days along with help interpreting them. The law bars schools from using results for high-stakes decisions like holding a child back.
Used well, this is the opposite of the old wait-to-fail model, and the International Dyslexia Association’s 2025 definition update is explicit that literacy support before and during the early school years is particularly effective. The risk is what happens to the words. A screener result is a flashlight, not a verdict: it tells you where to look, today, while your child’s reading brain is still wiring itself. Treat a risk flag as a starting signal for the right kind of practice, never as a fixed identity for your child.
Three questions turn this news into action at any school, in any state: Which screener does our district use? What specific instruction follows a flagged result? Has our school put literacy funds into a coach or teacher training? California’s numbers show scores follow instruction. Parents who ask about instruction, not budgets, are asking the question that predicts whether their child’s school will move.
I’d love to hire a literacy coach. It’s great the state is offering the money, but we just can’t do it. We don’t have the capacity.
Laura Lurns · Learning Success expert
Every child in this story was capable the whole time; what changed was the method the adults used. The villain was never a struggling reader, and it was never a teacher either. It is the idea that reading develops naturally, an idea that left generations of capable children guessing at words while everyone waited for a bloom that was never coming. You hold more power here than any budget line: the science that moved California’s scores works at a kitchen table too. The Learning Success All Access program builds the underlying skills reading depends on, with a free trial and a personalized Action Plan you keep either way.
See what All Access gives your child
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You describe what you see at home. We turn it into a plan you start this week.
- Answer 5 short questionnaires about what you already notice, 30–45 minutes at your own kitchen table
- Your child sits no test and gets no score: nothing to schedule, nothing for them to dread
- You do the answering, the AI does the writing, and a person reviews it before it reaches you
- Access all 40+ courses instantly: reading, math, focus, processing and more, with new ones added regularly
Why we use AI, plainly: it writes from a knowledge base our team maintains and audits. We work through it line by line and pull anything the evidence stops supporting. The roadmap you get on Tuesday reflects what we corrected on Monday, and a human still reads it before you do.
Your school district must evaluate your child free of charge if you ask in writing, whatever your income and whatever the outcome (US, 34 CFR 300.111 and 300.301(b)). That route takes time and answers a different question than you do. This one starts today, from what you already know.
Your answers stay yours. We do not sell your personal information, and we do not hand identifiable assessment data to outside AI companies to train their models.
A screener is a starting point, not a diagnosis. If your child might need formal accommodations (an IEP or 504 plan), or you suspect a vision, hearing or medical cause, pursue a professional evaluation too. That is the only route to those supports.
References
- CalMatters (via KPBS) — California reading scores are up, thanks to literacy investments. Can the state do more? (Carolyn Jones, July 20, 2026)
- Public Policy Institute of California — Policy Brief: Lessons from California's Early Literacy Policies
- Sacramento County Office of Education — Overview of Senate Bill 114: Screening for Risk of Reading Difficulties
- Economics of Education Review (ScienceDirect) — Comprehensive early literacy policy and the “Mississippi Miracle”
- PBS NewsHour — Kids' reading scores have soared in Mississippi ‘miracle’
