Mississippi students of color outperform Minnesota’s in reading and math
A recent headline noting that Minnesota has worse reading scores than Mississippi made me chuckle — not because of the subject matter but because I have been writing about the Magnolia state showing the North Star state a thing or two about helping students academically for a number of years.
But I think the recent coverage is still missing the bigger story.
Yes, Mississippi fourth graders slightly outperformed Minnesota fourth graders in reading on the 2022 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), with their average score two points higher. Minnesota’s average fourth-grade reading score is now below the national average for the first time. (The NAEP reading test was first administered in 1992.)
It is academic performance by student subgroup, though, between the two states that is even more telling.
Mississippi Hispanic students outperformed Minnesota’s on the fourth-grade reading and math NAEP tests and the eighth-grade reading and math tests, last administered in 2022. And this was true in 2019, pre-COVID, as well. Mississippi black students outperformed Minnesota’s black students in fourth-grade reading and math, and eighth-grade reading. And even though Minnesota black students’ average eighth-grade reading score increased one point from 2019 to 2022, Mississippi black students’ average score for this same student group still came in higher, even after its four-point decrease.
This outperformance is not a one-off. Mississippi black fourth graders have consecutively scored higher than Minnesota black fourth graders on the NAEP reading test since 2015 and higher on the NAEP math test since 2017. Mississippi black students make up 47 percent of the state’s student body (204,558) compared to Minnesota’s 12 percent (102,511).
Despite spending far less per student than Minnesota, Mississippi has a better track record than Minnesota when it comes to helping its students of color grow academically. Mississippi’s overhaul of its reading pedagogy and its investment in training educators in the science of reading became a model other states are learning from. Mississippi lawmakers also passed the Literacy-Based Promotion Act (LBPA) that retains third graders who cannot read on grade level. The state’s retention policy is not just “repeating the grade,” writes Todd Collins at the Fordham Institute.
First, by law, retained students must receive a minimum of ninety minutes in reading instruction based on the science of reading and intensive interventions with progress monitoring, among other supports. The retention treatment is designed to specifically address their needs.
Second, retention plays a key role in aligning the system’s adults — teachers, parents, administrators — around meeting the needs of the students. If we want the students to do better, we need to improve the performance of the adults. As Kymyona Burk, the former Mississippi State Literacy Director, has described, Mississippi’s comprehensive literacy policy includes training all primary grade teachers and their administrators; state-provided literacy coaches, deployed directly to high-need schools; changes in teacher preparation programs; and adoption of new instructional materials — all centered around the science of reading, including the building of foundational skills.
Minnesota has recently overhauled its literacy education, which will take time before impact is known, and while the state allows retention, it does not require it.
Mississippi also offers its families more opportunities to access the learning environment that will meet the unique needs of their children — including two school voucher programs and an Education Savings Account (ESA). These programs help students with disabilities, dyslexia, and special needs access eligible private schools and education services such as licensed therapy, tutoring, dual-enrollment courses, etc.
This isn’t to say that the Mississippi education system doesn’t have room for growth, nor does this mean that everything Minnesota is doing isn’t working. But one thing is clear: Successful education reform efforts are underway in numerous states across the country that Minnesota can continue to learn from, with Mississippi being one of them.