OKC district sees improvement in third-grade reading scores

Oklahoma City Public Schools appeared to cut its third-grade retention rate in half this year.

Preliminary data released by the district during a Monday school board meeting shows that 16 percent of third graders might be held back due to unsatisfactory scores on the Oklahoma Core Curriculum Test, also known as the third-grade reading test. Last year's results showed that 29 percent of third grade students scored unsatisfactory.

“We’ve done a number of things this year [to improve reading scores],” Aurora Lora, associate superintendent of student achievement and accountability, said at Monday's meeting. “We implemented that 90-minute reading block in our schools. We should have been doing that 90-minute reading block forever.”

Approximately 3,944 OKC third-grade students took the state reading test this year and 2,845 scored high enough to be promoted to fourth grade, data showed.

The state allows some students to quality for a "good cause exemption." District officials said that 490 of the 1,099 students who scored unsatisfactory might quality for the exemption.

Lora said the district is hopeful scores will continue to improve.

“Reading is not a third-grade problem,” Lora said. “We have been attacking this by starting younger.”

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