Editor’s note: This essay is an entry in Fordham’s 2025 Wonkathon, which asked contributors to answer this question: “What needs to happen next—at the state, district, and school levels—for the science of reading revolution to fulfill its promise and ensure that far more children learn to read well?” Learn more.
A parent opens an envelope and pulls out a report card. It looks like the child is getting good grades on the sections related to literacy. But then a note comes home: “Your child has been identified for reading intervention.” The parent says, “What happened? I thought everything was fine.”
This disconnect between the information a parent or caregiver receives and what the school knows about a child’s performance is not uncommon. Research shows that nearly nine in ten parents believe their child is at or above grade level in reading (88 percent). Yet according to the Nation’s Report Card in 2024, only 31 percent of fourth grade students scored proficient in reading.
Parents and caregivers are not receiving routine, timely data on how their children are progressing in reading. Additionally, parents and caregivers often lack basic information about whether a school or district has aligned its efforts with the science of reading, trained its teachers to implement new curricula, or equipped its teachers with resources to support evidence-based instruction.
While changes to policy and practice in states across the country are encouraging, we will not be able to dramatically increase the number of students reading on grade level without more deliberate engagement of parents. We need to better equip parents and caregivers to accelerate literacy gains through greater transparency and accountability, and by addressing common system gaps.
States, districts, and schools must harness parent power to increase the impact of existing policies and enlist parents and caregivers as partners in boosting literacy instruction implementation. The key components are:
- Equipping parents and caregivers as partners in accountability.
- Increasing awareness of student literacy performance.
- Providing actionable recommendations for parents and caregivers.
Equipping parents and caregivers as partners in accountability
Given that state assessments typically begin in third grade, it is challenging for parents to understand how well a school is teaching reading in the critical period before the end of third grade. Universal screener tools like the DIBELS are teacher-administered, posing potential hazards for aggregating the data to share publicly. But parents and caregivers should receive insights into whether their district or school is implementing key components of state science of reading laws.
Some states require specific types of communication, primarily related to students who may be eligible for intervention. Yet we need to move beyond check-the-box exercises to meeting parents where they are. Districts should provide regular information and data to parents in accessible ways that are not an afterthought, but are core to their approach.
States can:
- Require districts and schools to share publicly on their websites the literacy curriculum/a used at each grade level.
- Require districts and schools to share publicly which assessments are administered to assess literacy skills, and on what frequency, for early elementary students.
- Require districts and schools to share publicly how educators are trained on science of reading and literacy curriculum implementation.
Further, states can encourage districts and schools to proactively share this information with parents and caregivers at in-person events, such as kindergarten orientations and back-to-school nights, and through regular communications, including district and school newsletters.
Increasing awareness of student literacy performance
Schools notoriously keep parents in the dark about individual student performance, whether it be through difficult-to-decipher standards-based report cards or shying away from sharing clear information about how a student is doing in class. Many states now have a requirement for parents to be informed if students are off track, related to third grade retention policies. But it would benefit all parents and caregivers if there were uniform approaches to sharing students’ literacy assessment results on a routine basis. That information should be found in the primary place parents look for information on student progress: the school report card.
Districts can:
- Provide a twice-yearly literacy assessment score on the report card for students in grades K–2 (e.g., on the first and final report cards).
- Provide detailed literacy assessment reports for students identified as needing additional support. While some states have templates that indicate specific areas where the child is struggling, this approach is not universally required, and in some cases, a child begins intervention without a caregiver receiving the actual assessment report or any explanation of the specific challenges the child is facing.
- Develop explanatory cover sheets for assessment results for all students to summarize what the results mean, what questions to ask of the school about support, and how the school will track progress and report back to the parent or caregiver. Plain-language explanations support a better understanding of challenges and how to support the child.
In this information-rich age, districts and schools could also test out what methods are most effective to inform parents and caregivers. Would a short video help? New technological tools such as AI provide more options than ever before to provide customized communications. Additionally, school calendars can be arranged to provide more regular opportunities to discuss students’ performance. For example, could schools routinely schedule parent/caregiver conferences not only in the fall but also in the spring?
Providing actionable recommendations for parents
Parents and caregivers are passionate advocates for their children, express interest in resources to support learning, and can have an impact on reading performance, but frequently schools keep them out of the loop on how to support literacy. While elementary school students often receive math workbooks that allow parents insights into the strategies in use, a common literacy assignment is to “read with your child.” That’s a great activity, but schools can do more to give caregivers guidance on how to support students with literacy. While states are banning the use of “three-cueing” due to its pervasiveness in schools, parents may not be aware of best practices. One study in Massachusetts showed that parents lack an understanding of which literacy methods are proven, with only 29 percent of parents indicating that phonics is the most effective method, versus cueing or a combination.
As an added bonus, parents and caregivers who have a better understanding of evidence-based approaches to teaching literacy are great “implementation detectors.” They can be alert for guidance from educators that may be outdated or unaligned to ensure that any misunderstandings are addressed, rather than persisting. States have developed resources on the science of reading, but parents and caregivers are most likely to receive and process information from their school.
Schools can:
- Provide plain-language resource guides for caregivers on how they can support students with literacy, with examples of specific types of language to use with reading with children or when conducting daily activities.
- Share information on the types of strategies that are effective and those that are less effective (e.g., “look at the pictures” is not a helpful approach).
- Share access to parent-focused curricular materials provided by the curriculum provider.
- Provide access to literacy tech tools that are vetted and aligned with the science of reading.
- Send home decodable books, rather than legacy literacy materials such as leveled readers.
- Send home letter manipulatives and examples of the types of games you can play with the letters.
- Share lists of grade-appropriate books available at local libraries or the school library.
These strategies at the state, district, and school levels are mutually reinforcing. By increasing transparency about literacy instruction, improving access to digestible student performance data, and providing resources aligned with the science of reading, parents and caregivers will be better equipped to hold schools accountable for teaching their children to read and be more effective in their own efforts to reinforce reading instruction.
Systematically engaging and informing parents will provide the boost states, districts, and schools need to launch our country to new heights of reading achievement.
