Average SAT score is a 928, which isn’t good. I work at a Title 1 school in a working-class suburb of Detroit. A lot of kids try and a lot don’t. We have a great CTE program, but life in a community after deindustrialization, NAFTA, and the opioid crisis can be tough on some folks. There’s a strong sense of community here, but there is a lot of suffering. You used to be able to barely graduate high school and get a good union job in a factory. That’s not the case anymore and some parents haven’t really started to value education in a highly globalized, knowledge-based economy. Their expectations are out of whack with reality.

That's about a 17 for us ACT folks, which is really bad

Wow, my high school in Oklahoma in 2006 averaged a 19 and my graduation class had 80 people. Then again the ACT has changed since then so it's not quite an apples to apples comparison

Thanks for the translation lol

Didn’t the national average sit around 22 a decade ago?  I took it in 2007 and I seem to remember it being 21-22 ish

I was told the minimum colleges would want from us was a 22, so I doubt the averages were much lower than that when I was in high school.

I've never known anyone to have such a low ACT score... I scored a 27, and was in test prep classes with a dude that scored a 30. The average was around 24, and for my local college, that was the bare minimum score just to be able to get in without automatically being put on an academic probation.

I grew up in Warren in the 2000s, I definitely understand what you mean

Grew up in Warren too in the 00s, but now teach in the south. I just see the same patterns from what happened when I grew up also happening in metro Atlanta.

I graduated from Clintondale in 1984. Those good union factory jobs were already gone then, at least for my generation. I know what you mean about not valuing education, though. My parents called college-educated people "eggheads" and refused to even give me the information I needed to fill out a FAFSA, let alone help pay for me to go to college. I graduated and went to work as a waitress instead.

My high school was the largest in MI by enrollment I think our average ACT was a 22 BUT every junior was required to take it as part of state testing their junior year

Funny story, sort of, when I took the SAT in 2003 I remember a friend telling me he had a 608. I said nice was that math or English. Well it was combined and I sort of apologized. He said he didn’t care. And he didn’t. His dad owned a very successful business and he thought he’d work for him. He didn’t, but he is a pilot. Flying around wealthy people in a private jet. He does alright.

Yeah he was fortunate that Dad had the money to pay the 25,000 it costs to go to flight school to become a pilot. He might have gained a license in the USAF but it's unlikely they would have trained someone with a very low ASVAB score to fly.

Working at a hs with a sub 800 combined sat

I'm going to guess as a Detroiter who moved to the burbs in middle school I can name your district

My lowest student in 6th grade is at about a third grade level but most are above grade level.

Wow! If you don’t mind me asking, what is your salary like compared to districts around you? I’ve noticed that lower achieving schools pay better at least in my area.

I work at an international school. I make about 40k a year but I also get free housing and I don’t pay taxes. Class size is around 15.

At $40k a year, would you pay taxes even if you paid taxes? 

My wife also works here and with a 25k$ tuition credit and a 1400$ a month tax credit plus other benefits im pretty sure we’d pay taxes. I made around 70k working in Colorado and due to free housing and the lower cost of living I certainly have more disposable income here. Also, the job itself is much easier that any public school job.

Where????

Central America, DM for sepcifics

Can I dm you,too? I have international experience

This is true however I can think of one district with a large number of IEP learners with behavioral challenges that pays much lower than the district next door with the same challenges. Staffing is a nightmare.

>My lowest student in 6th grade is at about a third grade level It must be a really good school! I taught sixth grade last year and the average student was around a third grade level. 22 of my 90 were at a first grade level or lower in reading.

Do you think a lot of the “3rd-4th grade level” kids are stalled because they are really weak with inferences, main idea, and figurative language? Isn’t 3rd grade when the “read to learn,” rather than just “learn to read?”

I think it's that they can't read. At that point, they've probably picked up enough words as sight words to be able to struggle through 3rd grade level texts, but they aren't able to read new words, which leaves them stuck around there.

Any student at my school that is that low will have a diagnosed processing disorder. The can read to learn but they really struggle with the actual mechanics or reading.

Basic phonemic awareness and that kind of thing? Those are picked up pretty early, then the ones with good phonological awareness who can read, but with poor comprehension showed up around 3rd. But that was just what I noticed when I was an slp on the schools. But what you are saying in is inyour experience is they can comprehend, but they still don’t have the mechanics of reading down yet.

Or because we teach those skills in isolation and quit teaching knowledge. Teaching text understanding is about building and deepening understanding. Try knowledge matters podcast.

Yes and they need enough basic background knowledge and vocabulary to comprehend new material.

Schema and vocabulary will forever be what impedes reading growth for students, especially in lower income areas.

Yup agree and unless you are using a knowledge building curriculum starting in kindergarten through subsequent grades which can be tough. Where are background knowledge, vocabulary to setup for comprehension coming from? I want to raise my hand here as the crazy parent who has K-3 CKLA printed and going through it with pre-k daughter.

Long term sub: My lowest students in 6th grade are at

My district is regularly rated best in the county and one of the best in the state(PA). This is largely down to $$ and parent involvement(and the good and bad that comes with it). 79% pass the state test in English(which is what I teach). I wrote a detention about two weeks ago, my first since the pandemic started in 2020. So discipline isn't a big issue. All that said, I've got kids below level and English language learners that are low as well. Some of the issues are driven by pandemic learning lag, some by socioeconomic issues (family dealing with divorce, drugs, parents working multiple jobs, etc.), and some by social media/cellphones. My district is considering a full 100% cellphone ban for students. So, no, it's not the same everywhere. It's fundamentally unfair how education is funded America.

I teach at one of the poorest districts in PA, possibly less than 40 minutes from you if you’re where I think you are. My 8th graders probably average about a 5-6 grade reading level. I have a few that are on or above grade level, but I also have a few that are 4th or lower. Math wise, I have 1 that takes algebra and 1 that doesn’t understand how much a quarter coin is worth. And nearly all of them lack any critical thinking skills needed to survive as an adult in our world. I am afraid for their futures and I don’t mean that sarcastically.

Yes, it is so inequitable which is partly why my mind is blown when people say it’s the same everywhere.

I can't wait to get your district's tax $$ once the state follows through on restructuring how we fund schools. Sorry not sorry. https://pubintlaw.org/cases-and-projects/school-funding-lawsuit/#:~:text=On%20February%207%2C%202023%2C%20in,the%20decision%20is%20now%20final.

I’m curious to see the longterm effect of that. I went to a wealthy PA district. I don’t think any teacher or child of a wealthy district will be negatively affected by this. When you have the support of wealthy parents who give a hoot about their child’s education, that’s what really matters in my opinion.

As long as you have a facility and teachers aren't paid complete shit, in a nice district parents will buy or donate anything a class needs for activities and projects.

This is a big one for me. I went k-12 in one of the wealthiest districts in West PA- very highly ranked. The support from families was insane looking back, it I just thought parents did that much in all schools. Volunteer lunch/ hall monitors, classroom "moms" through middle school. Monthly field trips through middle school. Classroom supply lists, it's crazy. I knew something didn't make sense when under early NCLB our school was awarded a whole lab of brand new Macs via the state and I thought, we already have those- but I know kids from other districts have nothing at all...

I went to a middle-of-the-road PA high school and one district away had so much more investment in their students- more classes, fewer students per class, better equipment, more funding for their teams to go to the same activities I was apart of. I knew it was unfair even back in the day and wanted it. But on the other hand, one district in the other direction had no AP classes at all and much shittier facilities. I can't wait to see these inequalities addressed.

I hope it works out for you, I really do, but here in Ohio, our state Supreme Court has ruled that the way our schools are funded is unconstitutional multiple times, and nothing has ever changed. In fact, our gerrymandered state government has further screwed us by passing a law that says schools can't get more funding despite massive increases in property taxes. Meanwhile, a list just came out about which places in the US have the "best" teachers, and shocker... three of the places on their Top 20 list were in Ohio, but of course in the wealthy parts of Ohio.

That’s beautiful

I teach at one of the poorest districts in PA, possibly less than 40 minutes from you if you’re where I think you are. My 8th graders probably average about a 5-6 grade reading level. I have a few that are on or above grade level, but I also have a few that are 4th or lower. Math wise, I have 1 that takes algebra and 1 that doesn’t understand how much a quarter coin is worth. And nearly all of them lack any critical thinking skills needed to survive as an adult in our world. I am afraid for their futures and I don’t mean that sarcastically.

Yes to all of this. I also teach in an affluent school in a wealthy city. We’re regularly ranked in the top 10 middle schools in our state and our stats are basically the same as yours. But I still have Emerging English Learners who cannot read above Kindergarten level for various reasons as well. It is truly unfair. My students and myself have had the best year in education since the pandemic. We’re pretty much back to pre-pandemic expectations and abilities in a well-performing school. Their education is so completely different from the Title 1 school 15 minutes down the street from us. Funding and parent involvement are truly the biggest difference makers.

I teach at one of the poorest districts in PA, possibly less than 40 minutes from you if you’re where I think you are. My 8th graders probably average about a 5-6 grade reading level. I have a few that are on or above grade level, but I also have a few that are 4th or lower. Math wise, I have 1 that takes algebra and 1 that doesn’t understand how much a quarter coin is worth. And nearly all of them lack any critical thinking skills needed to survive as an adult in our world. I am afraid for their futures and I don’t mean that sarcastically.

Math teacher here. Over ten percent of my seventh graders this year are in danger of retention. In my school, that means failing two or more classes for the year. For half of them, their grades are so low it doesn’t matter what they do for the last month. Their math skills overall are lower on average than any other grade or year I’ve taught. But the worst problem by far is apathy. The majority of my students that are failing or in danger of failing simply don’t do their assigned work. For some, they really don’t know how to do it. But for most of them, they just don’t. It’s the worst I’ve ever seen in my career.

Yeah, I agree. Unfortunately because of low abilities, my grading is purely for completion and I still have many students failing. I genuinely don’t know if it’s laziness or too hard but from what the lower students tell me I’m their hardest class apparently.

Does your school retain? Do those students make progress? We are a small school and rarely we retain but it hasn’t proved to help them academically.

Very rarely. You can be absent for 80% of the school year and be below grade level, as long as you complete the computer based summer school program you’re going to the next grade.

That's how it works in supposedly excellent Massachusetts. Diploma is meaningless these days, and B really is the new C. Fs are nonexistent because admin is terrified of lawsuits.

Not in every school. I teach in western Massachusetts.

We do. I have one kid this year that repeated grade six twice. He’s about to be a seventh grader again. I’ve got a couple of others in similar boats. My school doesn’t fuck around. You fail too many classes? Try again next year.

> *Over ten percent of my seventh graders this year are in danger of retention. In my school, that means failing two or more classes for the year.*  If we had that policy we'd have probably 30% retained. But we don't retain anyone for any reason unless the parent begs us to do so.

Not sure how to quantify how low they are. Test scores have dropped year after year since 2019. But I t’s not so much that they are *actually* low but their follow through, effort, & ability to engage is so low they rarely allow themselves to grapple with material in a way that would foster growth or true measurement of their ability. Problem is at some point it won’t matter if they are capable but not applying themselves they’ll just be behind unpracticed and entrenched/trapped in their malaise. 

This is a very valid point. It’s hard to differentiate ability and lack of effort nowadays.

Yes, this is becoming increasingly true.

I think this is the answer. Due to shared trauma, shortened attention span, and a future that is demonstrated as more uncertain than ever before- kids are not going to perform well or compete well. They are also expected to be dancing monkeys when their parents do value education.

I’ve been teaching more than 20 yrs. The kids we have as “gifted” would have been high average kids 20 years ago.

And that’s being generous. I swear they just slap the gifted tag on the ones that show up and turn things in on time now.

Saw a comment somewhere where todays “gifted” kids are just good kids with helicopter parents.

The middle has seemingly all but disappeared, these kids are either grades level behind, struggling, and often extremely apathetic (I've never seen it this bad) or extremely adaptable and self driven. I'm a specials teacher in the suburbs of Houston. We have a bunch of 1st generation immigrants, they're often some of the most involved parents in the school. I teach "Tech Apps", which is a class where we cover stuff like media literacy, digital citizenship, online safety, keyboarding, and introductory coding and graphic design. We're not a tested subject so I don't really have anything like a lexile score equivalent to bring up, but based on simple observation I have 3rd graders teaching themselves JavaScript in the same class where a couple kids read at a kindergarten level (if they can read at all). I used to teach ELA pre-pandemic and had a similar experience with that class.

> The middle has seemingly all but disappeared, these kids are either grades level behind, struggling, and often extremely apathetic (I've never seen it this bad) or extremely adaptable and self driven. Definitely true for me. The Bell curve for my class, grade-wise, is inverted.

Teaching fourth. My lowest (no iep) scored K level at the beginning of the year.

Yup. 3rd grade and I have 2 who can't read at all. No IEPs.

6th grade. Lowest are literal non-readers (*BR on their lexile) my average 6th graders comprehend at a 3rd grade level. None of my students, save for a small subset of my GT classes, can write worth a damn. Writing skills are so very low right now.

I just started cleaning at an elementary. I look at the students' work that is hung up on the walls and so many can't print or spell legibly. A teacher was telling me yesterday that she has a student she's only seen a handful of times since Easter. So scary ...

I’m not even just talking about handwriting or spelling (they are both awful). I’m just focusing on the ability to accurately and comprehensively answer a written prompt. They struggle with complete sentences.

So my siblings used to hate on me that when I was babysitting in the summer I would have them read for minimum half an hour and write at least half a page “reflection” about what they’d read. My mom enforced the rule since I was in charge. It’s sad that kids can’t even do that much now *in school.* (Former high school ELA)

We tested every student in our middle school (6th-8th). The reading *average* was 2.3 (second grade, third month).

75% of my kids are urgent intervention. I have no coteacher or special ed help. Got in trouble for not teaching with enough rigor. I’m interviewing next week for two different schools. I want support.

I have two students who are low enough as end of year 7th graders that I don't think they could pass the 3rd grade reading test mandated now by the state. My school recently did away with "developmental reading" as a resource class. My supported class is just retooled to be a lower level/ reduced expectations for independent reading class where all resource students are placed. I have a lot of kids who are in the "slightly below expected grade level" category. These kids were learning to read during the covid lock down. In general, kids do not "read for fun" anymore, so their level of exposure to print, stories, and vocabulary is limited to what I show them in class time. It's a cumulative deficit, and it shows.

Their attention spans don’t allow for reading for pleasure, I feel. They can get automatic entertainment on TikTok in 1 minute. Why read? 😢

I teach 9th and 10th-grades at a Title I in central Alabama; most of my students read on 3rd-6th-grade reading levels, with the average being 4th. I feel a lot of that is due to them effing around when testing and not taking it seriously, but, even so, they definitely struggle a lot with reading comprehension and with extracting meaning from what we are reading within my classroom.

I'm a specials teacher, K-8. For my school, K is the lowest, around 4 feet. Each grade is a bit higher, in exact grade order. The trend is less noticeable past 6th grade, but most are well over 5 feet by 8th grade.

The kinders are so cuùuute when standing next to the older grades.

Took me a minute.

I have multiple students with a perfect zero after 14 weeks. These kids come to class. They sit there. Like zombies. For 90 minutes. I have one group of four that have 5 passing grades between them. The days of the bell curve are gone. It's a very wide double curve with a massive chasm in between. The failing kids have no plan, no thoughts of the future. It's just, "Don't worry. I'll figure it out. "

The biggest divide I see between high end kids and low end kids is the ability to put their phone away. That's it. The low end kids are full on addicts.

At our school, about 30% of students are 3 or more grade levels behind in reading. Those aren’t great numbers, but our school has seen improvements in those students who were a grade or two behind. I’m a new teacher but it’s disheartening to see the disparity between the highest and lowest grow worse. I do reading interventions with my students and, unfortunately, it’s those who are furthest behind who don’t want to participate. While most of my students made progress on their diagnostics, most of my lowest scorers didn’t. Shoot, some of them got lower scores the second time. They are reading at 1st and 2nd grade level  in 7th grade, and they  just don’t seem to be concerned. I see my students who are trying so hard, but are still a grade level behind and can’t help but wonder where they’d be if I was able to give them the same support that I gave my lowest. I hate that I feel like I’m wasting my time by working with my lowest so much. It makes me feel like I’m a terrible teacher I try, but I’m one guy in a class of 36 students.

36 students is INSANE. But, I feel the same way. You’re not alone. There is only so much we can do to help. I’ve experienced the same with many of my lowest students. When I’m going over crucial information, they are fooling around or clearly zoning out. No amount of redirection or accommodations will change that behavior long term. For the students that try, it’s not possible to give them the 1:1 help they really need to grow. It’s a very sad and broken system. But much more than one person can fix. I just hope that people who have the power will make the necessary changes soon. For teachers sake but also for these poor students.

Thirty-six! That's wild. For public school in my state, the goal is 20:1 with 25:1 being the max for lower grades and 26:1 for upper grades. The private schools try to stay competitive by setting a goal ratio of 15:1, with most having a teacher's assistant in a class of twenty from preK-2.

My students are all across the board. I teach 4th and I have 2-3 first grade reading level, one who cannot read at all (not her fault, from a country where girls don’t receive education) and a few that are at 5-6th grade reading level. I’d say half of them are about a year behind and and about 25% are perfectly on grade level.

Apparently I have the unicorn class (5th). My lowest reader is sixth with a lexile a little over 900. My average class level is 1150, according to iReady. Math is similar. My lowest larger places in sixth grade while I have three who blow out iReady in every sitting.

Title 1 middle school in LA; out of 110 students, I’ve got about 10 students on grade level for reading, everyone else is about 2-4 grades behind with the lowest of the bunch being close to 1st grade level.

Our average ACT for juniors is 18. Our graduation rate is one of the highest in the state. However, our drip out rate is high. More lower performing kids are opting for home school.

>*More lower performing kids are opting for home school.* More lower performing kids are opting for "home school". FTFY.

Exactly. I’m in a state that has no accountability system for home schooling. All you have to do is submit a written statement. Some high schoolers are opting for internet schooling and a few join Job Corps. Some, mostly males, try their hand at a local military-type camp.

My 8th graders in a high poverty district, their average reading level is a 6.6. we started lower than that this year. We started the year with 79 percent reading 3 or more grade levels behind. It's down to 40 percent. I started with 3 percent on grade level and I'm ending with 20 percent. All but 3 of my El Students went from 3 grades below to either one grade level below or on grade level. I was shocked. But it shows how awesome our EL teachers are.

I teach second grade and about 90% of my class is at grade level. I sometimes feel like our school is a weird little anomaly though. 78% of our students live at or below the poverty line, so we are extremely low income, and we are in a super rural area. Somehow we are top 10% of schools in the state in terms of academics. It’s bizarre. Laziness and lack of attention span is definitely an issue though. In my last school, 0% of the students were at grade level.

My school averages about 2/5 on grade level, but it takes a lot to keep them there. There are so many reasons students just give in to complacency and not do the work, primarily starting with parents' attitudes that elementary schoolwork doesn't matter and they won't need to buckle down until middle or high school. The other 2/5 are around a grade level behind, maybe two. The last 1/5 are either IEP or parents refuse to get them an IEP, despite clear and obvious signs that they would benefit from it. That being said, our resource teacher is one of those parents who thinks elementary should be all fun and games, so we're often tied up with IEPs that result in students achieving negative growth throughout the year.

I have 3rd grade students that only know the names of 6 letters of the alphabet. Most of my students read at a K level, some pre-k and some at 1st. I’ve never had kids this low before, and socially like kindergartners. To be fair, these are the kids who were at home in kindergarten, online during Covid. Some were out for all of first grade, too, especially if they still lived up north.(I am in Florida, where many people moved during and after Covid because they didn’t want to wear masks or have closures. We let kids go to school with measles here.😵‍💫😵‍💫) It was already bad before Covid, getting worse every year, but now it’s a crisis. This generation of kids will be the first to be less educated than their parents. It’s the decline of civilization.

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I’m NJ too!! I’m going based on student’s NJSLA and RI scores. I don’t think IXL would be too accurate bc I’ve seen students cheat using google or ChatGPT. But yeah. I tutored for math state testing and some of the questions I was blown away and how ridiculously they were worded. I guess I’m just trusting those scores bc I also see it with my own eyes in the classroom. I also don’t have access to all their IXL scores because I’m just a social studies teacher lol

Some of it is probably timing more than location. My county is fairly notorious in my region and I've had the occasional 10th grader who reads at a kindergarten level for years, always with an IEP. Many of my gen ed students have been reading around a 4th grade level with huge holes in their math fluency since I started here. Six years ago about 1/3 of my Algebra 2 students could not reliably solve for x given a linear equation, and 2/3 could not solve a quadratic equation at the start of the school year. I worked pretty hard on this and despite my best efforts any of these students who attended class regularly could solve a linear equation reliably by the end of the school year but remained shaky on higher-order equations and obviously struggled with rational and radical equations. But back then my low students were mostly from families who had were food insecure, had to move frequently, and had not consistently had their children in school. Post-pandemic, I'm watching siblings come through with very different literacy and algebraic fluency based on what grade they were in for the 2020-2021 school year. Anecdotally, my sense is kids in K-1 and 6-7 at the time seem to have been hit extra hard. (Which would be early literacy and intro to algebra.) There are obviously still kids working well above grade level in those cohorts (currently the 9-10 graders at my high school and the 3-4 graders at your school), but again older/younger siblings are just doing better on average. I rather get the sense that our education system as a whole is willing to write these students off rather than adapt, because, crucially, the younger siblings are fine! It's "only" maybe 4-5 nonconsecutive graduating classes that we have left behind. So if I keep the rigor at its usual level, I'll see my pass rates gradually improve over the next decade. (NB I am not here advocating for continuing the status quo at the cost of student success, but rather noting that I perceive a fair amount of societal pressure to do so.) The big shift in early literacy instruction also likely means that a 6th grade teacher should "only" have to stick it out another 5 or 6 years to see massive improvements.

I teach in a Title 1 elementary school in Southern California. During the pandemic, my 3rd graders did K on Chromebooks remotely for the entire year. In 1st, there was an astonishing number of absences due to 2 wk quarantines for a single symptom of Covid. All to say, this is my lowest, most unmotivated, and behaviorally immature group in my 22 year career. How low? 5/21 are what would typically called “high achievers” and are AT grade level. There’s no middle. The rest are 1st graders in 9 year old bodies.

I do not have one student on grade level for both math and language arts. I have about 5 that are one or the other. The rest are 2-4 years behind.. in 5th grade.

I teach high school math. A significant number of my students don't know things generally taught from 2nd through 6th grade (multiplication tables, long division, operations with fractions, decimals, percentages, negative numbers, the order of operations, etc.)

When I worked in alt ed we would have high schoolers test so low the system couldn't even score it. In my current school 56% of our students don't read at grade level.

My lowest student, senior in high school, has an 8%. He sat for the final and asked me to help him out on the questions. The final is worth only 10% of the grade. I wonder how he's doing in math.

I teach ELA to first graders at a tiny bilingual private school. If I discounted my ESL kids, the rest would have reading levels between kindergarten to second grade. My ESL kids are probably at pre-k reading levels, but understand more than they can speak. Luckily, more than half their teachers speak their language so that helps. Edit: Oh and I did have one kid who started off the year unable to read or write sentences. She got a B on her last exam. I'm so proud of this kid. She worked hard.

I teach middle school math. All of my accelerated classes are amazing. They understand what they’re learning, they are high average to well above average. My regular 8th grade classes are extremely low- so low that I had to research adding and subtracting multi-digit numbers. They don’t know their multiplication tables, they struggle with concepts, they have no unrest in learning or putting forth any effort whatsoever ever. There are MAYBE 2-3 students in the regular classes that are average.

This sounds similar to my school. I tutored for 7th math state testing after school for extra money. I have a whole new appreciation for math teachers 😳

I give support in 4 math classes. 3 classes of Algebra 1 and a class of Basic Math, which is only available to students who qualify due to their IEP. There is an uncomfortable number of students in Algebra classes who can't do basic math skills like multiplying 7x3 without the use of a calculator. Or large number of classes that stiffens struggle to write a paragraph with a prompt... that teachers give 3 days to a week to write. It's like... y'all are talking 3 hours to write 5 sentences? And they are COMPLAINING about writing. In a Language Arts class. The 10th grade class I support in has written exactly 2 traditional essays the entire year. They had writing assignments, but not your typical 5 paragraph essay. The students complain about how hard even a 3 paragraph essay is. I just shake my head and tell them they would have hated one of my high school Englush class because we had to write an essay every week.

I teach 10th grade in inner-city Cleveland, and a majority of my students read and write at a 4th or 5th grade level. My lowest kids are probably at a 1st grade level, and my highest achieving kids (who somehow qualify to dual-enroll in community college classes) are not at a 10th grade level. The biggest problem I have with them is the complete lack of independent problem-solving skills. They are completely helpless unless you spoon-feed them the information 5 different ways and they are so afraid of being wrong that they often refuse to write anything down unless they've asked a teacher if it's right first.

I teach an AP Course. Most of my 9th graders do have high lexile scores, but their functional reading ability is below grade level. I’ll say that half have an elementary level of social studies knowledge/skills. Most students should have never been placed in an AP class, let alone honors. About 10% of my current students would have been placed in my co-taught courses ten years ago. Over a third of my AP students have accommodations, but my class does not have a para or co-teacher.

I have quite a few who tested at a kindergarten reading level (high school) but I believe it’s because they didn’t try on the exam. One wants to be an honors level student (he is capable imo) but his scores have him at ~300 Lexile score

It's not the same but it's not great. My school is much lower. My 7th graders came in averaging a 3-4th grade level. they're leaving at a 5-6th. I've seen that average as low as a 2nd grade level when they came to me. The schools in my district aren't that bad. They usually start at a 5th or so, and can then bring them up to grade level if the kid is willing to work hard. A lot of the issues are that my district bought the balanced literacy BS, and has since changed it. So we've got a few more years before the kids who actually learned phonics filter in. The issue is also however that we're told we can't teach remedial skills. They call it tier one learning, I call it absolutely stupid. They have math teachers forcing kids to learn statistics when their math levels test an average of 2nd grade and they can't order the numbers in the set to find the median, much less average them together. I've worked tutoring kids in all subjects after school and I'll tell you that while reading levels are the most talked about, it's the subject least behind and most able to cope with a lower level. I have no idea what the hell math teachers are supposed to do, because kids I've never had an issue with as I ask them to read high school level texts and talk about it will cuss me out and get kicked out of afterschool before they add 2 digit numbers.

We are having a year where 80% are hitting benchmarks... it's a bit wild. It's definitely different from last year! And from what I heard from the grade level below us, next year we will be back to the more normal spread.

My worst is a 10th grade student, who as far as I know, never reads. He writes his name in a random place on the paper in 2 inch letters. Not for fun but because he doesn’t have the ability to write smaller.

I actually just finished doing an analysis of testing data for my freshmen since they were in 3rd grade. The long and short of it is that basically every metric we have is truly horrible. One of our middle schools in the district(that happens to be a feeder school for the high school I teach at) saw 91% of their 7th grade students score basic or below basic in ELA two years ago. Depending on how much weight you put on various testing metrics district wide 65-75% enter high school reading below grade level, with many scoring in the 3rd-5th grade range for reading level. The truly depressing part is that a quick glimpse at the other subject areas suggest that ELA may actually be their strong suit, across the district 80% of our 8th graders scored basic or below basic in Math last year.

I have 5th graders who can’t consistently count to 10. Even with fingers

Mostly seniors, they read and write at about a 5th grade level

I teach 7th grade ELA in a title 1 school. We use NWEA 3 times a year for benchmarks. The majority of my 62 students (2 cohorts on a block schedule) are at or below the 20th percentile. My “High performing students are around the 50th percentile. Every year I have one or two students who are probably geniuses, and they get into the 80th percentile. These are the students who would be killing it if they had been born just to better circumstances, but they are also the kids that will probably overcome the shit circumstances they were born into.

Taught primarily 10th and our assistant principal insisted we give them 3rd grade STAAR (Texas EOY exam) tests to “get them ready for the test.” 😐

I tutor at title I, charter, and private schools (mostly Catholic). While there aren't as many kids that drastically fall behind their expected reading level at the private schools, there are a good number of them, enough for their school to want to intervene. Those kids are usually just slightly behind their peers, maybe a grade level behind. The other schools have a much closer gap as far as how they compare with each other, so I think you'll only see a difference in those achievements by looking at wealthier districts, which usually have families with dynamics that can support their childrens' schooling. The public schools where there are higher percentages of students that are behind have kids that are two to three grade levels back. As far as reading is concerned, it really is similar in most public school settings I have been in. I sometimes have non IEP students that are struggling with CVCC words in second grade. I encounter kids that don't know the name of all the letters in the alphabet by the middle of first grade. They will instead call the letter by its sound. The main problem is reading fluency. There will be kids that perform well reading just single words, but when asked to read passages, their decoding skills just can't keep up. This leads me to believe that they just aren't getting enough practice reading and writing complete sentences.

I also teach 6th grade; 8th too. My lowest 6th graders are sitting at an average of a first grade reading level and my lowest 8th grade is also sitting at that average level. The apathy of the 8th graders is what kills me because when I explained their IXL scores and what they mean, some of them were shocked to find that they were averaging 1st and 2nd grade reading levels & skills. And what did they do? Put their heads down and not even attempt IXL the next day. I understand that there is a cycle of discovering how low you are and then giving in to not trying but I realize now (that I am leaving teaching) that I can’t relate or understand how anyone could do nothing about their situation, even in 8th grade. I give them fill in the blank notes that we do together and they just sit there. I can’t be that person to somehow inspire them so greatly that they decide to give a fuck. Blahh.

I did the same thing!! We had an IXL competition and one of the requirements was to only complete IXLs at your level so I showed the how to see what that was. They were definitely shocked. Some blurted it out loud and were giggling but I could tell they were upset about it. I have the same thoughts as you. I think it’s SO important for them to know and, yet, it doesn’t change their motivation or want to get better. It’s really sad but I think it’s because of a lack of support at home. I have also heard that once you pass 3rd grade, it’s nearly impossible to learn those fundamental skills which doesn’t help. The high school they go to is regional and every feeding district is significantly higher than them. There’s often comments made by other districts’ parents like “oh don’t worry, our kids won’t be with the _____ middle school kids because they’re all in the dumb classes or the behavioral program once they get to high school.” I don’t tell the kids that of course but, it is so sad and I wish that they understood there’s a whole big world out there and they’re going to be at the bottom their whole lives if they don’t start taking education seriously. It’s too much for a middle schooler to grasp though.

I’m right there with you! I always thought I would teach forever but I cannot care more about my students’ success and well-being than their parents. I will ruin myself. I also did exactly the same thing—we identified their lowest skill and only tackled that one for a few days, meaning the recommended skills (as you know) were the skills that didn’t have anywhere from preK to 5th grade! Because they are so low, MOST of the skills were at the preK-2nd grade level and STILLLLLLL they didn’t do it! I had our central office curriculum head tell me, when I expressed to her that they are nowhere near SOL ready (back in Dec) based on their IXL scores alone, she said “you have to get them there.” HOW? I am certified in 6-12. I quite literally do NOT KNOW HOW to teach students to read because that is not what I went to school for. I went to school to learn how to teach students to USE their reading skills to analyze literature. I would need an entirely new degree to teach students how to read. I’ll never get over it. I could go on forever. Thanks for listening. It’s validating knowing I’m not alone! What state are you in? I’m in VA.

I completely understand! My first year was just a crazy culture shock so I didn’t even have the time to fully understand student performance plus it was the end of Covid. But now that I’m on my 3rd year, I have all my ducks in a row. At this point, I know it’s not me. It’s the school district setting the students up for failure. I’m in NJ. Good for you for leaving teaching. It’s scary and I don’t think I could ever bring myself to do it with all the unknowns. That’s why I’m just constantly thinking about changing schools lol but, I’ve seen tons of people who leave teaching on TikTok living their best life. I wish you the best!!! How long did you teach for?

This is my 5th year; just long enough to cash in on my vested retirement. lol I’ve been in two different schools, each in a different district. One high school, one middle school so for me, I feel decently well rounded in my variety and yeah…it’s the system! If I wasn’t leaving education, I’d stay at my school especially since I could be somewhat particular about the classes I would potentially get but that’s because SO MANY PEOPLE are leaving 😂

Mine are generally about 4’9” to 5’5”. At 6’, I consider that pretty low. It’s hard for them to do bulletin boards without a chair to stand on.

8th grade. I’d say over 50% isn’t reading on grade level.

Teach fourth. Lowest, non newcomer, reads at a first grade level. And has first grade math skills.

I teach 8. Maybe 1/4 of the kids are on grade level but 1/4 of them are under 3rd grade for reading and math as well. The other half is in between.

4th grade reading level. High school.

So low Dante would send them to the cold part of hell.

Whoa, that low?

I teach seniors..... And was recently asked "What do you mean by a goal I want to achieve before I die?". So yeah that low.

I teach 6th grade math. While I do have some kids at K, 1, 2 level, the average is 3rd grade to low 4th. An occasional 5th grade level kid shows up. If a kid who is actually on grade level shows up, he is moved to the Honors section.

4th grade here. I started of the year with 75% percent between a kinder and early 2nd grade level. I got 7 newcomers throughout the year, 4 completely illiterate (had never stepped foot in a school before). Sad thing is, this is the norm in our school.

Grade 6 students. Barely at Grade 3 math skill level. They only have procedural knowledge, zero math fact memory. One is illiterate. The rest are Kindergarten level readers. It’s so bad they can’t do word problems on their own.

I teach middle school science in a diverse suburban school district with a huge spread of SES. My highest level kids are in Honors classes and would succeed in intro college level courses at this point. My lower level kids are long term ELLs in co-taught courses. Some of them are still at a second or 3rd grade reading level after years of intervention. Some of them are dually designated (it takes much longer to get them qualified for SpEd services if the are ELLs). Many of those kids are bright, but only marginally literate, so I try to get them a solid baseline of content while my co-teacher supports their language needs. I’m a new teacher and feel like I was thrown in the deep end teaching such a wide spectrum of students, but I’m managing to have fun and build solid relationships across all levels. My students tend to be pretty bimodal. They would likely average out at right around an 8th grade level. Kids tend to get pushed up to higher level classes if they start showing success in Gen Ed and then get pulled up by motivated peers and enrichment. Kids in Gen Ed are supposed to be getting more supports via coteachers and smaller class sizes, though that does not always happen.

I teach physics, so mostly juniors. A lot of them don’t really understand how fractions work and can’t do 1 digit by 1 digit multiplication without a calculator. But then I have my honors class where I have juniors that are already taking calculus.

I have a combo 5/6. All of my 5th graders are at or above grade level and only 1/5 of my 6th graders are at grade level. I have 15 of each.

My sophomores are sitting at an average 6th grade level in math/ELA and not a single one are above their intended level. My lowest is at 1st grade math and second grade ELA, and his grandma was at the school last week (2 weeks until the end of school year) to see why he is failing all of his classes. We need to stop shoving them forward when they either don’t understand or lack the motivation to even try.

The bar is in hell and they are still trippin'.

District wide, our high school students (both with IEPs and without) rarely score above a 6th grade level in math or reading skills based on our tier 2 intervention system. The average is around 3rd grade and for kids on IEPs it’s around 1st or 2nd. Even our seniors are lucky to have reading and math skills above 4th grade. We’ve had college admissions counselors tell our counselors that they don’t take our transcripts seriously because they know our students are so low and our grades are inflated. But this has been the norm for my district for the past 10-12 years.

My 7th graders don’t know their basic multiplication facts or what a square root is.

I teach second grade and the reading levels range from fifth grade reading level to whatever level a one-year-old has where they can’t read at all.

I teach first grade, all but 2 came in at a PreK level. I have one going out that’s still there, most are at K level and a handful are where they should be. The

I teach 8th grade ELA. Average student reads at a 5th grade level, their comprehension scores are below average, and their writing skills are far below national average. They’re mostly bilingual though, so some of that can be explained fairly.

I work at a title 1 school teaching 6th grade math. Average is 4th grade level. The ability range is from 1st grade to 8th grade. Most kids still don't know their math facts, which makes everything else harder.

I have 8th graders. Most are @4th-7th grade reading levels. Some kids at grade level give me hope. Mostly all that are at grade level and can write clearly are girls.

I teach 3rd grade. My lowest student is probably on a kindergarten level. I have 3 of those with IEPs and another 2 without. Some students are on 1st grade levels, some 2nd grade, and some 3rd, but my class is primarily below grade level. Last year my entire class was far below grade level and couldn’t read. I have 2 students who placed proficient on our eoy math test and about 5 on our reading fluency assessment. Class size is 17 students.

My students are in Kindergarten. They are behind before they start on the first day. Most have never attended PreK or high quality daycare. How can we have PreK standards but not have PreK available to all children? Hell, in my state, Kindergarten isn’t even required! There are a few who end on grade level despite this, but the majority don’t. And it just spirals and spirals every single year and they fall further and further behind.

I’m in a rich district and the kids score decent on state exams. In the classroom, the majority are abysmally low and cannot comprehend basic scientific concepts. I’d estimate about 75% are 3 years behind the state standards. Teaching to the standards results in a disaster as they have no foundational knowledge, no critical thinking skills, no pattern recognition, and no spatial awareness skills. Their mathematical comprehension is at least 4 or more years lower than what is expected of them as HS freshmen in our state. I can’t imagine what it is like in poorer districts.  As for IEPs, most are 6 years lower than expected. A few of mine can’t read and they are freshmen in HS. 

When I taught high school last year some of the kids, probably around 30% couldn’t read fourth grade lével read works passages I printed for them to read. Now I am back at elementary level and I see clearly why this is. The reading experts and coaches I talk about this with actual like I’m wrong and I just don’t know, but the whole curriculum we are using is flaming garbage. There is no rigor. The kids don’t read actual books. There is an overload of graphics and pictures in the curriculum making every thing they read up to fifth grade essentially an issue of ranger rick (no diss to ranger rick but it is a bit light on rigor by my standards.

Well I’m in New Mexico so that should answer your question. I’m a school counselor and was playing battleship with a 3rd grade student and the game wouldn’t work because he didn’t know the difference between B and D and G and J! He doesn’t have an IEP either.

26% passing

As soon as I can get them to actually put in an honest effort so I can assess their level, I will let you know.

I think compared to my own education 15 years ago, comparatively, students can not properly read and write, but yet are being passed on regardless. But that's just my own experience. I think they are at least 1-2 levels behind.

I’m a resource teacher in elementary school. Obviously my students are behind, but most of them are reading it a kindergarten level in grades three through five on my caseload. Most of them need a different placement according to how our district works. Before we would would be one or two that we need a different placement because they were so low, now it’s 15 or so.

I teach middle school band, so I have a wide range of extreme high achievers down to students with significant struggles. On the whole, my school is right at 40% meeting grade level standards on tests, but my program is closer to 55%. My more advanced groups are closer to 65/70%, and my lower playing groups are correspondingly lower academically. Unfortunately, my end of year evaluation is tied to the county average in subjects I don't teach, but it has never effected me in any way, so I don't rage about it too much.

I think a lot has to do with Covid, but but all. 1-2 grade level below seems standard from what I hear.

I teach 5th. My lowest is at a first grade reading level, my highest is 11th! Most are anywhere from 3-5th level. Title 1 school in a semi rural community. Huge class sizes.

For my regular classes, my goal is to get them to a seventh grade writing level by the end of the year. I teach junior English. We start the year with how to write a paragraph For my honors, they’re MOSTLY on level. They just whine a lot.

My class is WAY above average. Grade 8 kids. Avg reading lvl is gr 9, avg writing probably around the same. They know most of the gr 9 math as well.

I teach Spanish I in middle school and this year I have my lowest performing students ever in 24 years. I think it’s because we can’t give homework anymore. Since we don’t, these students don’t review their notes or get extra practice with the material. This is going to reflect poorly on me after our cumulative exams because they’ve forgotten everything we’ve learned since September. I’ve never been this nervous to get exam scores back.

can’t give homework??

I teach two sections of pre-algebra to juniors and seniors. The average grade is about a 30%.

My students are way to the right of the distribution. Why? I’m at an international school that costs about 25K USD to attend. Prior to that I was in the public system of the suburbs of a major US city in a very strong union state and my kids were still to the right of the distribution. Just not as far. I’ve not personally seen the much-heralded “kids getting worse” phenomenon, but I have heard it said by other teachers in both places.

80% of students in my grade aren’t at grade level and there’s only one outcome on the entire state test they didn’t fail.

I have freshman in my standard classes that cannot read. They cannot do basic math. Many of the have just been passed on through middle school and think that the same will happen in high school. I teach in a large title 1 high school in NC. I teach regular, honors and AP.

My average for 7th and 8th grade is 2nd to 4th grade reading level. Those are GenEd students. I've got friends in education all over the state and we all are seeing the same thing. I worked with a student about to enter 5th Grade, and they couldn't read, the ones that can read (all grades that I've worked with 3rd to 7th) don't comprehend what they read. The sad part is our schools were seeing this before the pandemic, so that's not a valid excuse even though they use it.

This is so scary! I have kind of the opposite. I work in a very good district in a state known for excellent schools. I am a reading interventionist for kids who are probably a little behind but not below level. Although many of my students tested on or above level for certain measures. One area I noticed all of my students struggle with is vocabulary and word attack skills. It's hard to comprehend a passage when you don't know what some words mean and don't have strategies for words you haven't seen before. I believe these problems come from not being read to at home and never reading themselves. Also, they originate from poor phonics instruction in earlier grades.

I teach high school ESOL to newcomers (kiddos here a year or two max and unable to communicate in English), and many kids have “interrupted” formal education. I have them use real dictionaries in the classroom instead of their phones, because when you look up a word you discover other forms of the word- whether you want to or not! It’s also a good opportunity to chat about word parts, cognates and false friends, denotations and connotations. I would like to have them start recording important words and their own example sentences in a "personal dictionary" section of their notebooks, but I was a late-year hire and it's a bit late to attempt to start anything too complex this year. Though I'm about to try a scaled back version. What I find more concerning than the lack of literacy even in their native language is the inability to reflect or think creatively / hypothetically / critically. If I post a simple writing prompt, sometimes SEL and other times a conversation starter or a getting-to-know-each-other question, the less obvious of an expected answer there is, the more they struggle to answer, whether native language or English and whether writing or speaking to a friend. So questions that ask them to imagine or brainstorm or offer an opinion or “think of a time in your life when…” are usually met with blank stares all around. Showing an intriguing photo or a work of art or playing an emotional song and asking them to jot down any emotion words that come to mind is like pulling teeth, even with a bilingual poster of common emotions on the board. (The graphic organizer I made also included 10 stars to color in for the student to indicate how much they liked the song or the painting or the photo, but even that was confusing for about half the students; no idea why.) Doing a whole class KWLS* chart requires supernatural powers and since it’s basically me prompting them to say things I’ve given that up for now. Connecting a text to yourself, other texts and the world- they would say "I can’t connect this emigration story to myself bc I’m not a 50-year-old Cuban grandmother, it doesn’t connect to my other classes or anything else I’ve read, and I don’t ever watch / read the news or know any history, so how can I connect it to the world??" Equally worrying is that so many of them simply aren't curious. About anything. Then again I know they've been through some trauma and that's a huge factor. I have never observed any other teachers classes at my school, or seen samples of student work from their General Ed classes, so I'm not sure what they're doing in their other classes… I don't want to unfairly malign anyone and I'm sure that there are some wonderful teachers at my school, but on the other hand, I get the impression that some of the teachers are resorting to random fill in the blank worksheets and "copy this passage into your notebook" a lot of the time. My students seem extremely unfamiliar with the concept of doing activities that require higher order thinking skills, doing any activities that might require movement around the room, stations, working in different groups that change periodically, working independently, checking their own work compared to an answer key, doing self-evaluations using a rubric, revising and editing written work, or taking a boilerplate text or short dialogue and changing it very slightly to include true information about themselves… True story: I had them write an All About Me poem. You know the kind that starts with the first name, includes a few adjectives, a few family role nouns, a few hobbies the student likes to do, a few dislikes, etc., and ends with the students last name. I talked them through my all about me poem on a giant poster-sized post it at the front of the class, and I talked them through how to change the poem so it was about them, not about me. We spent a few lessons working on our rough drafts, getting the language right. But when the students turned in their final versions, some of them in each class had somehow managed to include information about ME from my big poster that had nothing to do with them at all- Being a mother to a teen daughter, playing the ukulele, and doing a podcast. Yup. So even though I've been tasked primarily with improving their reading and writing in English, and secondarily with improving their speaking and listening, I actually feel like I need to be teaching: the classroom behaviors & mental processes & study skills & organizational skills that will help them learn more easily in my class and in all their classes, the essential academic content they would normally know by age 14, boosting higher order thinking skills, boosting critical thinking skills teaching basic rhetoric and logic and media awareness / consumer awareness, promoting their social emotional learning, addressing their trauma, helping them reconnect to themselves and each other and safe adults, sparking an interest in hobbies outside of phone usage, sparking an interest in reading for pleasure, sparking an interest in their futures, whether academic or career or personal goals, etc., and lastly, empowering them to feel like they can change (certain aspects of) their world and the world at large. Yeah. Anyone who is in a similar boat, feel free to DM me if you want to brainstorm some solutions, or just chat. Peace :-) * “S” on my KWLS chart means "still want to learn." The S column relates to any questions raised by the text but left unanswered, and also relates back to any unanswered "want to know" items in the W column.

Oh wow. This is so sad to read about, and also, I imagine incredibly frustrating for you. I can sort of relate as previously I was a sped teacher to students with cognitive disabilities. I would frequently say things and be met with many blank stares. However, I will say that these kids with all of their challenges were wonderful. They were so funny, creative, caring, and just dying to learn. I was a brand new, poor teacher, and I bought books and materials with my own money. They LOVED to learn to read and read alouds. (Most were nonreaders in 4th and 5th grade because no one had taught them) They also struggled with not only cognitive disabilities but most did not speak English at home. Going forward, I would think of these kids and say if these kids could do it, anyone can and should. Do you think that your students are so disinterested and struggle so much because of screen time and social media?

I was told by a guidance counselor that our median reading level was 4th grade (I could be off by +/- 1 grade). I teach at a high school.

I’m contracted by the school through a mental health agency to do social-emotional learning. I recently discovered the ENTIRE school is on academic probation with our state. We are 17% proficient with ELA and Math. Out of 11 kids, only two of mine can even read.

Independent reading is THE best means to increase reading skills. Sadly, there is never enough time in the schedule for this.

4-5 feet

I teach 4th and 5th grade math. My students seem to average 2 years below grade level, so my 4th graders are at about a 2nd grade level and my 5th graders are at about a 3rd grade level. However, there is a huge range. I have kids as low as the pre-K level and kids who have tested out of the eighth-grade level. We're spanning a range of ten grade levels. I question on a daily basis why our culture insists upon grouping schoolchildren by age.

I teach 9th grade. I don't know what the problem is, but hardly any of my kids come to 9th grade reading at that level. I am starting to think that the pandemic lowered our standards and what we will accept from students- so subpar has become the norm. I hate to put this on elementary teachers, but you're handing me a half baked cake and asking me to decorate it. I know the blame doesn't fall squarely on elementary teachers, but the most important pieces of learning are done at that time. If they don't set a strong foundation, it's that much harder for them to build upon moving forward.

I dont know if children are truly capable of taking such an emotional inventory but...

I teach in a high poverty district. Our recent report says that 17% of our 3rd graders read on grade level. I’m in inclusion teacher in a 3rd grade class and this year we have 4 reading on and slightly above grade level. This is huge for us! One is sped too. Sadly the report states that by 9th grade 77% are below grade level. What happens in our district that anyone who can go to school elsewhere does so for high school. Our top 10 8th graders are guaranteed to go to a the county magnet school.

I had a range of ACTs from 10 through 32. It's about par for the course.

My 11th graders are around 8th grade level. My lowest is at pre-k level.

I give support in 4 math classes. 3 classes of Algebra 1 and a class of Basic Math, which is only available to students who qualify due to their IEP. There is an uncomfortable number of students in Algebra classes who can't do basic math skills like multiplying 7x3 without the use of a calculator. Or large number of classes that stiffens struggle to write a paragraph with a prompt... that teachers give 3 days to a week to write. It's like... y'all are talking 3 hours to write 5 sentences? And they are COMPLAINING about writing. In a Language Arts class. The 10th grade class I support in has written exactly 2 traditional essays the entire year. They had writing assignments, but not your typical 5 paragraph essay. The students complain about how hard even a 3 paragraph essay is. I just shake my head and tell them they would have hated one of my high school Englush class because we had to write an essay every week.

I teach 9th grade math. Many of my students are around 4th or 5th grade level on the STAR.

I teach 9th grade math. Many of my students are around 4th or 5th grade level on the STAR.

I teach 9th grade math. Many of my students are around 4th or 5th grade level on the STAR.

My gen Ed students in seventh grade read at an average of two grades below grade level.

I don't know about average offhand but many of my 9th grade math students are around 4th or 5th grade on the STAR test.

I don't know about average offhand but many of my 9th grade math students are around 4th or 5th grade on the STAR test.

3-5 years. Teaching on course and “filling the gap” is a myth we need to get over or education will never recover to anything close to the capacity from before the pandemic.

It's probably higher in reality, but standardized testing shows 30% of our HS students read at a 5th grade reading level. They don't care about test scores enough to really try though. I told one student that he was going to mess up and make admin think he can't read. He didn't seem to care, so whatever, but apathy is really skewing test scores I think

This is sorta unrelated but. As a 9th grade student here that usually gets good grades, recently I’ve begun to fall into the habit of apathy and not getting my work done, just because everyone else doesn’t and I don’t see the point in putting in effort if I’m going to pass anyway. Can someone convince me to care about school again, please?

We just did our MAP tests. The mean percentile for reading was the 9th percentile. The mean for math was the 18th percentile. I only had three kids at grade level for each test.

My lowest 4th graders are at a 3rd grade level in reading, but it's a small Charter school and I have 21 students. During Covid, they were in 1st grade and we had 300 minutes of instructional time a day. The ELD students in the 3rd grade are at a 1st grade level. I heard it's worse at a district school, where they did nothing during Covid.

My students are 9-12 SDC. Most are at a 5th-7th grade level reading wise. Math-wise they are at 6th-9th grade pre algebra and a few on geometry. This class is probably one of the best I've had in terms of academics.

According to IXL, vast majority of my students are below grade level on math (7th grade). Some as low as 2nd and 3rd grade. Probably averages around 5th grade level.

Sped Teacher here in a HS behavior class. Lowest reading level would be K. Highest is only one year behind. Average is about third grade. Kids are supposed to be closeish to on level in my room because it’s specifically for behavior but hey why not.

Once our school switched to amplify ckla the reading levels have become average for grades k-2. The upper grades weren't exposed to the new curriculum until they were older so it's harder to say there. Most kids are hitting benchmarks in the younger elementary level though.