Before the pandemic, only about 16% of MPS third graders read at or above grade level. Furthermore, Wisconsin has the largest Black-white achievement gap in the nation. Pre-COVID-19 scores for third graders in MPS show that 37-40% of white students were proficient or advanced in reading compared to 9-10% of Black students.

The ability to read by the end of the third grade is critical to a child’s success in school and lifelong earning potential. A study by the Annie E. Casey Foundation showed that students who were not proficient in reading by the end of third grade were four times more likely to drop out of high school than proficient readers.

The pandemic only made the problem worse.

We also recognized the $871 million in COVID recovery money that MPS received as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to improve student achievement.

We had to act.