Set High Goals for Reading

Gray Davis, the self-proclaimed “governor of higher expectations,” should demonstrate those expectations when it comes to the education of California’s children. Today, as the Legislature begins Davis’ special session on education, the governor should set a clear, solid goal. How about this one: In five years, two-thirds of California students--regardless of where they go to school, their family income, race, ethnicity or language spoken at home--will read at grade level in English by the end of third grade.

Boldly raising this bar will require the political courage to face down naysayers who insist this very ambitious goal cannot be met statewide because 62% of California third-graders currently do not read at grade level. In large urban school districts, like Los Angeles, the percentage is even higher.

Poor, minority or non-English-speaking students increasingly dominate public school enrollment. Cynics say those kids can’t be expected to read well. It’s time for all Californians to unite in saying that excuse won’t fly.

It doesn’t fly in Texas. Minorities account for more than half of the Texas school population, which is 38% Latino, 14% African American, 3% other minorities and 48% economically disadvantaged. Only California has a larger percentage of Latino students and, like Texas, its student population is increasingly poor. Yet, with demographics similar to California’s, Texas leads the nation in academic gains. Latino and African American students are improving faster than white students, one of the few states where that is true.

In Texas, all schools are held accountable, and high expectations are held for every pupil as well. In 1996, Texas Gov. George W. Bush, building on earlier reforms, announced a reading initiative: Every child is expected to read at grade level by the end of grade three and continue to read at grade level. The state does not dictate what schools should do to get those results. That flexibility allows educators to figure out what will work with their students.

Improvement is evidenced by the rising scores on the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills, a mandatory statewide test. Reading scores rose in 1998 for every group of students, including white, black, Latino, limited-English and those at risk of dropping out. The largest one-year gain was made by fourth-graders, 89% of whom tested at grade level in reading.

Why are Texas students outscoring their California counterparts in every category? Even in the student group in which Californians would seem most advantaged--sons and daughters of affluent, college-educated professionals--Texas outscores again. Might it have something to do with the high expectations set for student achievement?

Both states share a Latino heritage and increasing numbers of Latino students. In both states, many Latino children start school speaking little or no English. Yet in Texas on last year’s statewide test, 77.9% of limited-English third-graders, who took the test in English, were able to read at grade level. In California, about 10% of limited-English third-graders met or exceeded the national average in reading. Why such disparity?

Ultimately, it comes down to leadership, from the statehouse to every schoolhouse, that raises expectations for every student and tolerates no excuses for failure. Texas students began taking the statewide achievement test in 1994, and the results have been going up ever since, a trend other governors envy.

At a Los Angeles dinner Monday honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Davis said he had called the special session so that every child could learn to read by 9 and have a credentialed teacher. Fine words, but as he takes the lead he must change the mind-set in Sacramento. In a state that spends billions on public education and accepts too little in return, the governor must set deadlines and get everyone to commit to a tough but reachable goal: Two out of three California children will read competently in English by the end of third grade--and not 20 years from now, not 10 years from now. The state can’t meet a high goal if it is afraid to set one.