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Yesterday, something truly historic occurred. Nine years after Alaska Policy Forum began calling attention to our state’s poor student outcomes, and proposed adopting “the Florida reading reforms” as a remedy, legislators have finally […]
Only one in four Alaska fourth grade students are reading on grade level. But there is a prescription for this problem. Debra Van Dyke was formerly principal at Fort Yukon School in the […]
Reading by age nine is a crucial element of academic and professional success for Alaska’s students. Students who enter fourth grade reading fluently can learn the material; students who do not enter fourth […]
This op-ed was originally published by the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner and the Mat-Su Frontiersman in February 2022. An entire decade. That’s how long Alaska’s public schools have ranked in the bottom five […]
A student’s ability to read is a critical predictor of educational and lifelong success. A strong reading program, beginning in kindergarten and continuing into the third grade and beyond, gives students the best […]
It is a sad fact, but it is true: children who cannot read by nine rarely catch up to their peers. In 2019, only 25 percent of Alaskan fourth-graders were proficient in reading on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), and almost […]
Advocates of higher school spending often frame the problem as a no-brainer solution to assist struggling students. However, the school funding issue in Alaska is far more complicated; a recent report by the […]
This is a copy of the verbal testimony APF provided to the House Education Committee on May 8, 2021. Click here here to open a printable PDF of the testimony in a new […]
With one policy change, Alaska can improve learning, reduce poverty and ensure more students are on the path to success in career and college. Alaska invests huge sums into public K—12 education but […]
This is a copy of the verbal testimony APF provided to the Senate Education Committee on April 10, 2021. Click here to open a printable PDF of the testimony in a new tab. […]
It’s no surprise that reading is a critical skill for young children to learn. In fact, by third grade, students “stop learning to read and start reading to learn.” This means it is […]
Early in 2020, legislation was announced again to address the third-grade literacy crisis facing Alaskan children. Year after year, the problem has been discussed and legislation with viable solutions proposed—only to go nowhere. Finally, in […]
By Robert Pondiscio This article originally appeared on the Thomas B. Fordham Institute website on November 19, 2020. At the tail end of a recent symposium titled “Why children can’t read—and what we can do […]
In this episode, APF’s Senior Education Research Fellow Bob Griffin joins Casey Dschaak on the Alaska Conversations Podcast. Listen now as they discuss Alaska’s educational policies, including the Alaska Reads Act. They also […]
The Performance Evaluation for Alaska’s Schools (PEAKS) exam measures the performance of students and schools in both mathematics and English language arts (ELA). Routinely, Alaska’s schools woefully underperform on state and national standardized […]
Myth 1: ALL research indicates students should ALWAYS be socially promoted, even if they are far below expected proficiency in reading in 3rd grade. Reality: Over a dozen studies show the benefits of […]