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By Martha McHardy
US News Reporter
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The reading and math skills of fourth and eighth grade students has declined in multiple U.S. states, according to a recent report, New Mexico having the lowest averages.
Newsweek has contacted the Department of Education for comment via email.
Why It Matters
In 2024, 21 percent of adults in the U.S. were found to be illiterate, while 54 percent had a literacy below a sixth grade level, according to the National Literacy Institute (NLI). Meanwhile, Americans continually score either in the mid- or bottom-tier when it comes to math compared to their international peers, studies have shown.
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The NLI has previously reported that low levels of literacy costs the country up to $2.2 trillion a year.
What To Know
According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), grade 4 and grade 8 pupils in multiple U.S. states have reading and math skills below the national average.
Among grade 4 students, pupils in 20 states performed significantly below the national average of 237 points for math. New Mexico was the worst performing state, with a score of 224. In Alaska, students were 11 points below the national average, on 226 points. In other states, including West Virginia, D.C, New York and Arizona, students were between 1 and 10 points below the national average.
Click on the drop down menu above to see the maps for Grade 4 Reading, Grade 4 Math, Grade 8 Reading and Grade 8 Math.
Massachusetts had the highest average score for grade 4 reading and math, with a score of 225 and 246 respectively.
For reading skills among grade 4 students, 19 states had a score below the national average of 214. New Mexico had the lowest average of 201 points. Alaska was next in the rankings, with a score of 202. West Virginia, Oregon and Oklahoma also ranked low, with between 206 and 207 points.
Among grade 8 students, pupils in 11 states performed significantly below the national average of 257 points for reading. Students in New Mexico had the lowest score of 245 points, while pupils in Alaska scored 246, and in West Virginia, 247.
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In Delaware and Oklahoma, the average was 249 points for grade 8 students in reading. In the other states, which include Alabama, D.C, Texas, Florida, Nevada, Mississippi and South Carolina, scores ranged between 250 and 254.
Massachusetts had the highest average, of 268. In total, 16 states performed significantly higher than the national average for grade 8 reading.
For math, grade 8 pupils in 19 states performed significantly below the national average of 272 points. New Mexico received a score 16 points lower than the national average, making it the worst performing state. Pupils in another 19 states, including West Virginia, Alabama, Alaska and Florida, among others, all received a score of between 260 and 270. Massachusetts topped the list again, with students receiving an average score of 283 for math.
According to the The Hechinger Report, the data published by the NAEP shows the reading and math skills of fourth and eighth grade students are significantly below those of students in 2019, the last administration of the test before the pandemic, when the national average for grade 4 and 8 students for both reading and math was higher.
The report put the decline down to "the increase in inequality." According to the report, more than two-thirds of students in the bottom 25 percent of achievers are economically disadvantaged. Among these low performers, 25 percent are white, 25 percent are Black, and more than 40 percent are Hispanic. Additionally, a third have a disability, and a quarter are classified as English learners.
In contrast, fewer than a quarter of students in the top 25 percent of achievers are economically disadvantaged. This group is predominantly white (61 percent) and Asian American (14 percent), while only 5 percent are Black and 15 percent are Hispanic. Fewer than 3 percent have a disability or are classified as English learners.
More than 450,000 fourth and eighth graders, selected to be representative of the U.S. population, took the biennial reading and math tests between January and March of 2024 as part of the NAEP study.
What People Are Saying
Peggy Carr, the commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, said in a statement: "These 2024 results clearly show that students are not where they need to be or where we want them to be."
Martin West, a professor of education at Harvard University and vice chair of the National Assessment Governing Board, which oversees the NAEP test, told The Hechinger Report: "Certainly the most striking thing in the results is the increase in inequality. That's a big deal. It's something that we hadn't paid a lot of attention to traditionally."
Scott Marion, executive director of the National Center for the Improvement of Educational Assessment, a nonprofit consultancy, told The Hechinger Report: "The rich get richer and the poor are getting shafted. It's almost criminal."
The Department of Education said in a statement on its website: "Today's NAEP results reveal a heartbreaking reality for American students and confirm our worst fears: not only did most students not recover from pandemic-related learning loss, but those students who were the most behind and needed the most support have fallen even further behind. Despite the billions of dollars that the federal government invests in K-12 education annually, and the approximately $190 billion in federal pandemic funds, our education system continues to fail students across the nation.
"We must do better for our students. The Trump Administration is committed to reorienting our education system to fully empower states, to prioritize meaningful learning, and provide universal access to high-quality instruction. Change must happen, and it must happen now."
What Happens Next
Vivek Ramaswamy, who was previously set to head up the Department of Government Efficiency, said in December on X that Trump's plan to "dismantle the Department of Education" will be the first step to fixing low literacy and math rates in the U.S.
Plans to dismantle the Department of Education have not yet begun.
Update 1/30/25, 3:05 a.m. ET: This article has been updated with a comment from the Department of Education.
Update 1/31/25, 11:15 a.m. ET: This article has been updated to clarify that Scott Marion and Martin West comments can be attributed to The Hechinger Report.
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