RALEIGH (Aug. 13, 2020) – Even before the coronavirus pandemic, North Carolina was struggling to improve students’ ability to read by third grade – a vital precursor to college readiness.

And the exercise in online education forced by the pandemic certainly hasn’t improved matters.

As Debra Derr, host of the NC Chamber’s annual Education & Workforce Conference, told a virtual audience: By fifth grade, 85% of what a student learns is taught through reading.

In a panel discussion on third-grade literacy, Sepi Saidi, CEO of Raleigh engineering firm SEPI, Inc., said businesses need a strong talent pipeline beyond 2030.

Yet after more than $150 million spent on North Carolina’s Read to Achieve program since 2012, a 2018 study by NC State University found that just over half the state’s third-graders were reading at grade level.¹ The 2019 NAEP assessment found that only 36% of the state’s fourth-graders were proficient at reading – a 3% drop from 2017, Saidi said.

As an engineer, “When something’s not working, you don’t give up,” she said. “You fix it.”

DR. ANTHONY GRAHAM, Provost at Winston-Salem State University, noted persistent gaps in reading proficiency for fourth-grade students of color.

“What is criminal is that these performance gaps have persisted since at least 1992,” Graham said.

Graham agreed with a group of North Carolina CEOs that teachers need to receive adequate training in literacy.  “They have not been taught how to teach early-literacy skills,” he said.

Graham outlined five phases in the science of reading based on phonemic awareness and phonics. If a student doesn’t master one phase, that student can be stuck there for life, he said, and resulting frustrations can lead to students acting out.

Yet many teachers in grades 7-12 don’t receive any instruction in the science of reading as students themselves, Graham said.

He outlined how some academics adhere to a “balanced” approach where a reader is thought to predict words based on cues in what they are reading. That approach is not grounded in research, Graham said. As a result, instructors in the same College of Education might share different views.

“My colleagues, we have met the enemy, and he is us,” Graham said.

But thank God for Mississippi  – and not in the way that’s usually intended.

Tired of ranking at the bottom among states, Graham said, Mississippi placed an emphasis on the science of reading and literacy coaches in schools. Future teachers spend two semesters on early-literacy instruction, and professional development courses are based on the science of reading.

As a result, the state increased from 26% of third-graders who were proficient in reading in 2013 to 38% in 2019 – which Graham called a significant lift.

North Carolina educators took note. Though efforts here tend to focus on correcting the deficiencies of individual students, Graham urged state leaders to focus on improving the effectiveness of teachers.

“As a former football player,” he said, “I was made better as a football player by my coaches.”

Businesses should recognize reading not just as an education issue, but as an economic development issue, he said.

In a separate discussion, Andrew Kelly, Senior Vice President for Strategy and Policy for the UNC System, said the System is working to prepare teachers better to teach reading in pre-K through third grade.

“I think it’s incredibly important, and we have an enormous role to play as preparer of 40% of teachers in the (K-12) system,” Kelly said.

PRE-KINDERGARTEN is a key.

Trey Rabon, President of AT&T North Carolina and a member of the CEO Roundtable, said businesses have a responsibility to their employees and the community at large. AT&T, for example, partners with an elementary school in Durham in an after-school reading program.

Early literacy gaps are disproportionate among African-American children, who tend to start kindergarten nearly nine months behind their peers in math and nearly seven months behind in reading, Rabon said.

The CEO Roundtable set a goal of enrolling 75% of eligible children enrolled in NC Pre-K.

“Why? Because it works,” Rabon said.

A Duke University study found that increases in reading and math proficiency persist at least through 8th grade, he noted. Yet a 2017 study found more than 36,000 eligible children in North Carolina still weren’t served by NC Pre-K.²

Last year, he said, 34 counties, including even wealthy Wake County, declined to participate in NC Pre-K. Some counties felt they couldn’t meet the required 40% of program costs. Some found it difficult to hire qualified teachers.

The group of 20 CEOs from large employers in the state, including SAS CEO Jim Goodnight, recommended adjustments to the matching requirement based on a county’s level of economic distress, and that funds be targeted at transportation, classroom space and teacher pay.

And the General Assembly passed a bill last year establishing the goal of enrolling 75% of eligible children in every county.

Whether that happens in the midst of a global pandemic remains to be seen.

---

¹ https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article224161310.html. See also:  https://www.newsobserver.com/article234322937.html.
²https://hew.aveltsagency.com/2019/01/nc-pre-k-report/.