Oregon Department of Education Director Charlene Williams says of the latest round of reading and math scores, “Recovery is happening and will take time” (“Minuscule test score gains signal Oregon faces years of digging out from its post-pandemic academic hole‚” Oct. 2). But the results show a recovery that’s “happening” only in the sense that a marathon is happening if you’ve taken a couple steps — and to say it will take time is quite an understatement.
At the pace of improvement since 2022, when schools fully reopened following COVID shutdowns, it would take Oregon students about 30 years just to get back to where they started before the pandemic in math. Reading scores are actually down slightly since schools reopened. But based on the progress since last year, it would take students about 20 years to catch up in that subject. And these pre-pandemic baselines were nothing to write home about: in 2019, about half of students were on grade level in reading and only 40% in math, with far worse results for the most vulnerable students.
Do Director Williams and her boss, Gov. Tina Kotek, believe it’s ok to wait 20 or 30 years for schools to rebound from the pandemic? If not, exactly how long do they think it should take and how will they make it happen? Oregon’s kids deserve a clear plan and far more urgency from their leaders than they’re getting right now.
Andy Jacob, Portland