Ohio's school districts saw a decrease in their Early Literacy ratings last year, which evaluate reading performance from kindergarten through third grade. The dip, reported in statewide school report cards released Tuesday, is attributed to changes in how the state calculates which students are promoted to fourth grade.
For the 2025-2026 school year, the average district across Ohio scored 65.9% on Early Literacy. This marks a decrease of 5.8 percentage points compared to the previous year's performance. Despite this overall decline in the Early Literacy category, which focuses on younger students, two of its three underlying components actually showed improvement statewide. These two components are directly related to how well children are reading. The third component, however, specifically tied to fourth-grade promotion, saw a significant decrease, driving down the overall Early Literacy score.
Early Literacy ratings measure three specific areas. Student proficiency in third-grade reading increased by 2.5% in 2025-2026 compared to the prior year. Additionally, improvement in K-3 reading over two consecutive years rose by 1.5%. However, the percentage of students promoted to fourth grade, based solely on proficient third-grade reading scores, decreased by 21 points.
This substantial drop in the promotion metric stems from a key change in the state's calculation method for fourth-grade promotions. In previous years, the state measured the overall percentage of students promoted to fourth grade, a figure that stood at 99.4% in 2024-2025. This older calculation included students who did not meet the reading proficiency requirement under the Third Grade Guarantee but were still promoted. Under the revised rules, the state now only counts students who achieve sufficiently high third-grade reading scores to be promoted to the next grade. This adjustment caused the promotion rate in this year’s report cards to fall to 78.4%, as it no longer includes students promoted despite not meeting the score threshold.
Interestingly, some schools received higher star ratings in the Early Literacy component even as their raw percentage scores declined. This is due to a simultaneous change in the state's Early Literacy star scale. Last year, schools earning between 0% and 58% received one star. This year, the one-star category was narrowed to 0%-47%, while two stars were awarded to schools scoring between 47% and 62%. For example, East Cleveland received an Early Literacy score of 50.1% on Tuesday, a slight decrease from 53.8% the year before. Despite the lower percentage, the district was awarded 2 stars for early literacy, an increase from 1 star in the prior year, reflecting the updated star thresholds.
However, not all schools saw an improvement in their Early Literacy star ratings. The Cleveland Metropolitan School District's (CMSD) Early Literacy score dropped to 33.6% on Tuesday, down from 48% previously, and the district received one star in Early Literacy in both years. Similarly, Akron City School District's Early Literacy score of 44.9% marked a decrease from 57.9% but remained at one star for both years.
It is worth noting that overall reading scores for all Ohio students, across all grades, showed an increase of 1.8% in 2025-2026, reaching 62.2% compared to the previous year. Early Literacy, specifically, contributes 12.5% to a district's final composite score. The Akron City School District cautioned last week that the Early Literacy component was partly responsible for the district’s composite score decreasing this year. For 2025-2026, Akron City received 3 stars in its overall composite score, a decline from 3.5 stars in the preceding year.
