If your child’s school got a low grade from the state, you know the knot in your stomach that follows: what does this letter mean for my kid, and what happens now? A Texas Tribune analysis of last year’s ratings found that among the state’s 302 majority-Black campuses, 20 earned an A while 105 earned a D or an F, a rate of 35 percent compared with 8 percent at majority-white campuses. The next round of grades lands August 14, and most coverage frames ratings week as a verdict: stay, transfer, or move away. The letter will not answer the question underneath, at an A campus or an F campus: how is reading taught inside those classrooms? That is the input the reading science points to most directly, it is the one Texas law now regulates, and no rating reports it.
Texas releases new A-F school grades on August 14. Before the letter renders its verdict, here is what it measures, what it leaves out, and the reading-instruction questions that tell you more about your child’s year.
Common questions
What does a Texas school’s A-F grade measure?
Largely STAAR outcomes from the previous school year, along with growth and other indicators. It is a summary of test results, not a report on teaching methods, curriculum, or how the school responds when a child falls behind. Two schools with the same letter could run their reading blocks in opposite ways.
My child’s school received a D or F. What should I do first?
Ask instructional questions before making any move: which reading curriculum the school uses in kindergarten through third grade, what replaced three-cueing after House Bill 1605, how the school spots a child falling behind in reading, and what changes once it does. Keep the grade away from your child’s self-story; a campus rating describes test outcomes, not your child’s ability to learn.
How do I find out if my child is behind in reading, whatever the school’s grade?
Watch for guess-heavy reading, avoidance, and slipping confidence, and act early rather than waiting for a report card. A parent screener asks structured questions about what you are seeing at home and gives you a place to start; the Learning Success dyslexia screener is built for exactly that moment. 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’s the only route to those supports.
What is three-cueing, and why did Texas ban it?
Three-cueing teaches children to identify words using meaning, sentence structure, and visual cues, which in practice invites guessing from pictures and context. Eye-tracking research by Keith Rayner showed that skilled readers process nearly every letter, and Mark Seidenberg describes three-cueing as matching how poor readers read. Texas prohibited it in kindergarten through third grade classrooms and in teacher preparation in 2023 under House Bill 1605.
Texas releases new school grades Aug. 14. The letter reports last year's test scores, and nothing about how reading is taught. That question belongs to parents at every campus.
Twenty A’s, 105 D’s and F’s, and a Choice No Parent Wants
The Tribune’s newsroom, with data analysis by Rob Reid, examined the state’s most recent A-F ratings, which grade more than 9,000 campuses largely on results from STAAR, the state’s standardized exam. Roughly 15 percent of schools statewide received the lowest grades. Among majority-Black campuses the distribution skewed hard: 20 A’s, 105 D’s and F’s, and about 60 percent scoring a C or better. No majority-Asian campus received a D or an F. Eight percent of majority-white campuses and 19 percent of majority-Hispanic campuses did.
Meredith Anderson, a researcher with the United Negro College Fund, summed up the pattern bluntly: “Even if we have these bright spots, overwhelmingly the state isn’t serving our Black students well.” Education Commissioner Mike Morath defended the accountability system while conceding the outcome: “That being said, the results are still unacceptable.” Morath pointed to Houston ISD, home to eight of the 20 A-rated majority-Black campuses, where Black students posted large STAAR gains after the state intervened in 2023. Critics quoted in the article question whether those gains survive the district’s teacher departures and student exits, felt most among Black families.
For families, the analysis lands as a decision with no clean option. Mikole Montgomery of Fort Bend ISD enrolled her sixth-grade son Jaleel at Amy Coleman Middle School rather than the F-rated middle school near their home. “This is a very difficult thing,” she told the Tribune. “I don’t take the decision lightly.”
Even if we have these bright spots, overwhelmingly the state isn’t serving our Black students well.
Laura Lurns · Learning Success expert
The Grade Reports Outcomes. The Lever Is Instruction.
An A-F grade is a summary of last year’s test outcomes. It arrives after the school year it describes has ended, and it carries no information about the decision schools control most directly: what happens during the reading block. Two campuses wearing the same letter could be teaching reading in opposite ways, and the rating will not surface the difference.
On this point the science is settled and specific. Reading does not develop naturally the way speech does; it has to be taught explicitly and systematically, a conclusion the National Reading Panel reached in 2000 and one that cognitive scientists from Stanislas Dehaene to Mark Seidenberg have reinforced since. Keith Rayner’s decades of eye-tracking research showed that skilled readers process nearly every letter on the page and lean harder on letter-sound information as they improve. Guessing words from pictures and context is what struggling readers do, which is why Seidenberg called the three-cueing approach “descriptive of how poor readers read.”
Texas acted on that evidence. In 2023 the Legislature passed House Bill 1605, which prohibits three-cueing instruction in kindergarten through third grade reading and bars teacher preparation programs from training new teachers on materials built around it. The law is on the books; whether it has reached your child’s classroom is a separate question, and it is exactly the kind of question a letter grade never answers. One caution as you ask it: phonics taught well is necessary and it was never the whole picture. Reading also draws on language, attention, memory and processing speed, which is why the International Dyslexia Association’s 2025 definition acknowledges co-occurring challenges across multiple systems, and why kids who struggle with reading deserve a look at the skills underneath, not another year of waiting.
Key takeaways
- The disparity is stark: 20 A’s against 105 D’s and F’s across 302 majority-Black Texas campuses.
- The grade skips instruction: Ratings summarize STAAR outcomes and report nothing about how reading is taught.
- The law backs your question: Texas banned three-cueing in 2023; ask any campus what replaced it.
Questions That Outrank the Letter
Whatever grade appears on August 14, treat it as a prompt rather than a verdict. Ask the school directly: Which reading curriculum runs in kindergarten through third grade, and what replaced three-cueing after House Bill 1605? How does the school identify a child who is falling behind in reading, and at what point in the year? What changes for that child once identified, and who delivers the help? Those answers describe your child’s actual year. The letter does not.
Guard the story your child hears out of all this. A campus grade describes a school’s test outcomes; it says nothing about your child’s mind. Struggling to read says nothing about how smart a child is, and the IDA’s 2025 definition dropped the old IQ-based framing entirely. A child who overhears the phrase “failing school” needs to hear the other sentence too: reading is a set of skills, skills are buildable, and the right kind of practice changes the trajectory.
The disparity the Tribune documented is real, and the adults in Austin will keep arguing about causes and remedies. Your child’s reading year is happening now. The parents who get answers about instruction, at A campuses and F campuses alike, are the ones the system ends up answering to.
This is a very difficult thing. I don’t take the decision lightly.
Laura Lurns · Learning Success expert
Every parent deserves to know what a school is teaching, not only what a rating system counted a year later. The villain here is not any campus or any family’s choice; it is an accountability habit that grades outcomes after the fact while the instruction that produced them stays invisible, and that waits for failure before anyone asks how reading is taught. Your child is capable, your questions are legitimate, and Texas law now stands behind them. If you want a clear picture of the skills underneath your child’s reading before the next report card renders its verdict, start with the Learning Success All Access assessment: you answer questions about what you see at home, and the roadmap that comes back names what to build first, not a label.
See what All Access gives your child
See MTSS for schools
Is your child struggling in school?
Get your free personalized learning roadmap
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
- Texas Tribune (Jaden Edison; data analysis by Rob Reid) — Tough choices face Black parents when schools struggle
- Houston Public Media (Texas Tribune syndication) — Black-majority schools in Texas receive more Fs than A ratings
- Texas Education Agency — House Bill 1605 FAQs (three-cueing prohibition)
- ExcelinEd in Action — Why 8 States Banned Three-Cueing from K-3 Reading Instruction
