Research-backed ways to help middle-school readers

Several states have enacted K-5 reading laws, intended to improve reading outcomes for elementary readers. However, data indicate that middle-school students continue to struggle in both reading achievement and growth. “Policy recommendations for addressing the middle-school reading crisis” explains the middle-school literacy landscape and provides four strategic policy suggestions for state and district-level policy makers. These recommendations are designed to guide efforts to reverse the trend for middle-school students. 

The underlying reading crisis

Middle-school students have seen declining reading proficiency, according to data from the National Assessment on Education Progress. The NAEP shows that eighth-grade reading scores have declined by five points since 2019, with just 30% of students achieving proficiency levels. Meanwhile, NWEA research highlights that middle-schoolers now require nearly a full year of additional instruction to catch up to pre-pandemic peers. 

While the 2020 pandemic shone a spotlight on literacy issues, secondary literacy has been a long-standing issue. This isn’t a pandemic-only phenomenon as NAEP reading scores for eighth-graders have seen minimal progress since 2005, and educators have long warned about adolescents’ struggle with reading. Following the same trend, 2024 12th-grade NAEP scores reflected the lowest reading scores since 1992, indicating that secondary literacy needs serious and sustained attention.

Middle school presents unique challenges

Middle school is a transitional and often challenging time for students.  In middle school, the comfortable structures of elementary school centered around a few teachers are replaced with discipline-specific teachers across the school day. Students rotate among different subjects daily and explicit reading instruction often wanes until it disappears, even as students must tackle increasingly complex academic texts across ELA, science, and social studies

This complexity is compounded for students in need of intervention and multilingual learners, who face significant reading demands without explicit support. Considering these realities, NWEA calls for a systems-level literacy approach, ensuring that interventions targeting younger learners don’t overshadow middle- and high-school needs.

Four key policy components for supporting older readers

The brief offers four policy components:

1. High-quality, grade-appropriate assessments: Middle-school assessments often only flag comprehension issues without diagnosing root causes such as poor decoding, limited fluency or weak vocabulary. The brief urges policymakers and districts to adopt diagnostic assessments that provide insight into student reading assessment scores and inform targeted interventions, specifically around multisyllabic decoding and reading fluency.
2. Flexible scheduling and policies for literacy throughout the school day: Instructional time is precious. Districts lose significant minutes to interruptions. A 2021 study in Providence, R.I., showed that nearly 20 days per year were lost to interruptions such as announcements, school visitors and phone calls. A single study is not enough to make a full recommendation on the use of time, but the brief does recommend leaders conduct time audits, repurpose planning periods or collaborative time for literacy, implement flexible instructional blocks and provide small-group reading opportunities.
3. Support literacy across all disciplines: By sixth grade, content becomes discipline-specific, introducing complex language—e.g., “mitosis,” “amendment,” “theme.” Middle-schoolers need more support than what they get in Language Arts. They require ongoing instruction in decoding multisyllabic words, vocabulary growth, fluency and navigating varied text types. That requires professional learning for teachers across all subjects, integrated into state literacy plans.
4. Partnerships with external organizations and “third spaces”: After-school programs and community organizations can extend literacy support beyond school hours — these “third spaces” have been shown to lower dropout rates, raise reading scores and boost GPA. The brief recommends policymakers incentivize schools to create and promote such partnerships.
   

Additional considerations

Bolstering the recommendations are four additional considerations policymakers should consider: 

1. Equity matters: Reading declines are evident across all student groups; solutions must be inclusive
2. Instructional transformation: Across disciplines, educators need evidence-based professional learning grounded in the science of adolescent reading.
3. Tackle absenteeism: Chronic absenteeism undermines any literacy policy or instructional redesign, so policymakers must also consider ways to improve student attendance
4. Boost motivation and engagement: Literacy is a social and communal activity. Struggling readers often lack motivation and participation. Interventions should include choice, goal-setting, compelling texts and collaborative reading to foster confidence and ownership.

Actionable next steps: From recommendations to progress

Here are practical actions readers can take to translate this brief’s recommendations into progress:

For policymakers

1. Ensure diagnostic assessment mandates: Pass or revise policy language to require diagnostic middle-school literacy assessments.  
2. Champion literacy-friendly scheduling guidelines: Encourage districts to audit instructional time, reduce disruptions and prioritize literacy in average school days.
3. Embed cross-disciplinary literacy professional learning in state plans: Update literacy frameworks to include and encourage professional learning for middle-school teachers across all disciplines. Such professional learning should include literacy in their disciplines as well as broader content area literacy.
4. Incentivize third-space literacy collaboration: Use legislation or grants to promote after-school and community-based reading programs.  
5. Allocate dedicated funding for adolescent literacy: Beyond early literacy, fund sustained programming and staffing specifically addressing middle- and high-school reading.

For district and state education leaders

1. Implement reading diagnostic assessments: Solicit and suggest diagnostic middle-school literacy assessments
2. Evaluate your school schedule: Ask, “Does this schedule meet the literacy needs of my students?” Support schools in restructuring schedules to include regular literacy blocks. Even 20 minutes extra per day can accumulate into meaningful gains.
3. Fund literacy professional learning across and between disciplines: Allocate resources and time for teachers of all subjects to learn adolescent literacy strategies, based on the science of reading and disciplinary literacy.
4. Institutionalize third-space literacy program: Design grant or incentive frameworks encouraging schools to co-host community-run reading initiatives.
5. Embed equity and progress monitoring: Disaggregate reading data by subgroup and monitor improvements after new program implementations. 

The brief emphasizes that literacy support shouldn’t stop at fifth grade. While 40 states and the District of Columbia have passed laws aligned with evidence-based reading practices for grades K–5, now it’s critical to extend resources, system reforms and sustained funding to address adolescent literacy needs and prepare students for the increasingly complex discipline-specific texts they encounter in middle school and beyond. 

This policy brief presents a multi-pronged path forward. But success depends on action, coordination, and sustained commitment—from district leaders and policymakers, not just classroom educators. By combining data-driven diagnostics, creative scheduling, cross-subject collaboration, community partnerships and equity-minded strategies, we can ensure that literacy support continues beyond elementary school, giving adolescents the tools they need for academic success and lifelong learning.

Opinions expressed by SmartBrief contributors are their own.

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