The purpose of this qualitative descriptive study explores how teachers described their perceptions within a mandated reading program, as the program supported reading comprehension skills for students in second, third, and fourth grade at three public elementary schools in Upstate New York. The theoretical foundation of this study was established…

The critical area of literacy instruction has long relied on the use of measurement tools and the resulting data to identify at-risk readers and deliver needed supports. When the COVID-19 pandemic caused disruption to education, measurement practices were altered and there was limited existing research available to predict the potential impact of…

Reading skills are the key building blocks of a child's formal education. Yet, the national statistics on literacy attainment are profoundly distressing: two out of three American fourth graders are reading below grade level and almost one third of children nationwide lack even basic reading skills. This study reports on an evaluation of the…

The Afterschool Alliance, in partnership with MetLife Foundation, is proud to present the first in their latest series of four issue briefs examining critical issues facing middle school youth and the vital role afterschool programs play in addressing these issues. This series explores afterschool and: the Common Core State Standards, students…

Research shows that summer slide--the loss of learning over the summer break--is a huge contributor to the achievement gap between low-income students and their higher-income peers. In fact, some researchers have concluded that two-thirds of the 9th-grade reading achievement gap can be explained by unequal access to summer learning opportunities…

This article presents a critical review of the literature surrounding the potential impact of undiagnosed and untreated vision impairment on reading development in the early years of primary school. Despite pre-school screening programmes, it is still possible for children to enter school with undiagnosed, uncorrected vision impairments. This can…

Students not reading proficiently by the end of 3rd grade are four times more likely than proficient readers to drop out of high school. This fact and other recent research on the importance of early literacy skills have culminated in an intense focus on improving 3rd-grade reading proficiency. The challenges of improving literacy are, in turn,…

There are hundreds of tutoring programs that utilize community volunteers being implemented across the country; however, there are few rigorous efforts to evaluate their effectiveness. This article presents findings on reading achievement from an evaluation of the New York City Experience Corps[R], a program that uses older volunteers to work with…

This study examined whether the "Experience Corps" program improved the reading skills of elementary school students who were at risk of academic failure. Nearly 900 first through third grade students in 23 schools in Boston, New York City, and Port Arthur, TX participated in the study. These students were randomly assigned to either a…

In 2006-07, New York City, the largest school district in the United States, decided it would follow several other school systems in adopting a progress report program. Under its program, the city grades schools from A to F according to an accumulating point system based on the weighted average of measurements of school environment, students'…

Success for All (SFA) is a comprehensive reading, writing, and oral language development program for students in pre-K through eighth grade. Its underlying premise is that all children, including those with limited English proficiency, can and should be reading in English at grade level by the end of third grade. (SFA can impact Spanish literacy…

This article reports that educators and experts across the country who work with English-language learners (ELLs) are moving toward a consensus that the federal Reading First program needs to be refined to become more effective for children acquiring English. Administrators in several big-city districts with large numbers of such students are…

A READING PROGNOSIS TEST TO MEASURE FUTURE ABILITY, BASED ON PRESENT SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE, OF CHILDREN FROM DIFFERENT SOCIOECONOMIC LEVELS WAS CONDUCTED. IT SOUGHT TO AVOID TWO MAJOR SHORTCOMINGS OF STANDARDIZED READING READINESS TESTS (1) THAT CHILDREN OF LOW SOCIOECONOMIC LEVEL WERE INCLUDED IN THE NORMS AND THEREFORE SCORES OF THESE CHILDREN…