Nixing inflated fourth grade promotion rates will strengthen accountability for early literacy

It’s no secret that improving early literacy has been Governor DeWine’s hallmark education passion. Under his leadership, Ohio is quickly moving toward the science of reading in elementary schools, and the governor’s latest budget proposal continues this push by supporting reading coaches in low-performing schools and calling for a universal diagnostic assessment in the early grades.

So far, discussions about early literacy have centered on the supports needed to launch the science of reading initiative, i.e., evidence-based practices that emphasize phonics and knowledge-building. That’s undeniably important, and lawmakers have already invested more than $150 million for professional development and curriculum overhauls. Yet as implementation continues, one of the key questions is how the state will hold schools accountable for effective implementation and improved reading outcomes.

At a basic level, the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce should check schools’ compliance with laws that now require use of an approved curriculum aligned to the science of reading. If a school is non-compliant, the agency should require immediate corrective action, including financial penalties if nothing changes.

Yet compliance can only do so much. Schools could simply check the boxes, without putting in the real effort needed to improve reading proficiency. Here’s where the school report card comes in, most notably the Early Literacy component, which first appeared in 2016. This element is supposed to hold schools accountable for reading outcomes in grades K–3, the very grades that are the primary focus of the science of reading initiative.

Unfortunately, the current structure of the Early Literacy component has a glaring shortcoming—the inclusion of fourth grade promotion rates—and Governor DeWine’s budget proposal wisely seeks to remove these data from the report card component.

As a quick refresher, Early Literacy consists of three underlying measures—third grade reading proficiency rates, fourth grade promotion rates, and an improvement rate among K–3 students deemed off-track in reading. Results are combined using a weighting system to yield a composite Early Literacy rating.

Table 1: Structure of Ohio’s Early Literacy component

There may have been some logic to including promotion rates when Ohio had a stricter third grade retention policy. But under heavy pressure from school groups—and despite evidence that the policy helped students—lawmakers gutted retention in 2023. Now schools may promote third graders who fall short of reading standards provided they receive parental sign-off.

This is an enormous loophole, and “social promotion” has indeed returned en masse across the state. In 2023–24, schools promoted an astronomical 98 percent of third graders to fourth grade, despite a statewide reading proficiency rate of just 69 percent. Some districts promoted 97, 98, 99, even 100 percent of third graders, despite less than half achieving proficiency (see, for example, Columbus, East Cleveland, Lorain, Toledo, and others).

One way to clamp down on widespread social promotion is to restore the retention requirement. But absent that, lawmakers should at least remove these wildly inflated promotion rates from the report card. The move would stop rewarding schools for advancing third graders to fourth grade in what is now a standards- and consequence-free policy environment.[1] It would also weaken the incentive currently in place for schools to push parents into approving a grade promotion, as schools would no longer get points for the percent of students promoted.

Most importantly, the governor’s proposal would—through stronger report-card-driven accountability—help focus schools on what matters most: ensuring students are proficient readers by the end of third grade and improving the literacy skills of children with reading deficiencies. To achieve these desirable outcomes, schools will need to rigorously implement the science of reading, practices that have been proven to help students learn to read.

Science of reading requirements and compliance checks are a necessary start in Ohio’s turn toward more effective literacy instruction. But strong accountability for outcomes is also critical. The governor’s proposed change to the Early Literacy component is a step in the right direction, and his colleagues in the General Assembly should approve this report card improvement.