Op-Ed: Three Years Ago, SBUSD Adopted Reforms to Teach Kids How to Read. Here's Why Nothing Has Changed.

There's a lot more involved in improving literacy skills than passing legislation - Newsmakers' schools correspondent offers a check list of where local educators can stop.

Apr 22, 2026

By Cheri Rae

In 2019, an opinion piece that appeared in the New York Times set a reading revolution in motion.

In the article, education journalist Emily Hanford focused the attention of teachers, administrators and policy-makers on the state of Mississippi—yes, Mississippi. She detailed how the poor southern state had shown significant progress in improving reading scores in national testing results. More than any other state.

Hanford detailed how the perennially low-achieving state had systematically instituted radical changes in its entire approach to literacy instruction, with significant investment in retraining educators and administrators as well as strict measures of accountability in curriculum implementation to make unprecedented progress.

What became known as the “Mississippi Miracle” seemed easy enough to emulate by simply changing curriculum. Politicians of every persuasion, hoping for a quick fix to address low literacy, introduced science-of-reading legislation in at least 40 states (including California), instructing educators to adopt curriculum based on science.

Unfortunately, well-meaning policy-makers and educators didn’t quite understand the assignment, nor did they do their homework to learn enough about the extent of the hard work done in Mississippi.

The lesson that looms is that there are no shortcuts in reforming reading instruction—not in Mississippi or anywhere else.

As struggles with literacy endure in the Santa Barbara Unified School District - three years after adopting a new, science-based curriculum - barely over half of its students are reading at grade level.

And a series of new reports and commentaries by one of the architects of the Mississippi Miracle point to some of the specific reasons why our local schools are still failing students: Successful implementation of the new curriculum requires a comprehensive approach based on proven principles and accountability at every level.

Miracle workers. The “miracle” in teaching kids how to read took more than a decade to accomplish, and went far beyond a change in instructional materials.

It included strong, experienced leadership and an unwavering embrace of Mississippi’s four policy pillars: 1) standards, testing, and accountability; 2) consequences for poor performance; 3) evidence-informed instructional policy; 4) support for implementation.

Since that widely-read piece appeared in the Times, Emily Hanford has evolved, from a respected education reporter to a deeply knowledgeable and highly influential literacy leader who is widely quoted for her expertise.

In the course of reporting on reading, she has had a great influence on changing hearts and minds about what works, what doesn’t, and why. Her podcast, “Sold a Story,” is required listening for anyone who wants to understand the complexity of reading instruction.

Now, another expert in literacy instruction has come forward, who also has a lot to teach about Mississippi’s comprehensive approach.

Meet Rachel Canter, the founder of the educational policy and advocacy organization, Mississippi First. She was one of the architects of the policy reforms that significantly improved reading instruction in Mississippi, and currently serves as the head of education policy at the Progressive Policy Institute.

She speaks with authority about what other states and districts are missing when they don’t fully grasp the breadth and depth of the commitment to change: It’s the hard, sustained work on all fronts that made all the difference in converting the perpetually bottom-dwelling state into the nation’s literacy leader.

Canter has recently shared her expertise in a series of reports, articles and interviews focused on the complexity and commitment that resulted in her home state’s transformational work in literacy.

“Mississippi’s progress is neither a miracle nor a myth, as some skeptics have insisted - it’s been a two-decade marathon,” she’s said.

She recently issued a 20-page report on the “Mississippi Marathon,” as she prefers to call it. In an article in the April issue of The Atlantic, “States are Learning the Wrong Lesson from the ‘Mississippi Miracle,’” Canter worries that other states have not gone far enough in emulating Mississippi’s success, and details how they need to do much more than simply change curriculum.

Flaws in California’s reforms. In her piece, Canter notes that California “passed a ‘landmark’ bill in 2025, framed as the fruits of a years-long to help more children learn to read. The state budget also funds science-of-reading training grants and some literacy coaches statewide.”

She also points out the flaws in the Golden State’s legislation: “But a lack of accountability presages failure for California’s big reform,” adding that, “California has also begun screening students for literacy difficulties, but only at the start of each year from kindergarten through second grade.”

District-Level Implementation. In a recent interview with the San Francisco Standard, Canter addressed concerns that reading scores in the San Francisco Unified School District— which adopted a Science of Reading curriculum in 2022 —are far from miraculous. Its school board recently extended by one year its ambitious goal of 70 percent reading proficiency among third-graders by 2027.

The first line of the article summarized the dilemma: “The San Francisco Unified School District spent millions overhauling the way its youngest students learn to read. Two years later, roughly half of third graders still can’t.”

SFSUD is not alone. Santa Barbara Unified has the same issue.

It’s been three years since SBUSD adopted its science of reading-based curriculum and offered optional teacher training in the intensive professional development program known as LETRS (Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling).

The most current national test results for Santa Barbara Unified reveal that just 51.88 percent of elementary students in the district meet state standards in English Language Arts.

Canter’s observations about San Francisco Unified’s concerns about their disappointing results pinpoints areas that apply locally as well:

Educators: “Are teachers being coached and by whom? How bought in are school administrators? Who is responsible for making sure teachers actually use the materials?” In San Francisco, an estimated one-third of teachers are not using the new curriculum, which she terms a “red flag.” She adds, “The question is why, and who is responsible for fixing that. But the deeper problem is in classrooms that are using the curriculum. Why haven’t we gotten to the change in student work we want to see?”
School board: “Are board members looking at achievement data at every single meeting? Because if they’re not, they’re missing their most important job.” She continues, “I want to know immediately what the plan is. I want to know what coaching looks like, how administrators are holding teachers accountable, and what teachers say they need differently. And what is the consequence if we don’t meet these goals?”
Equity in literacy: “When people tell me they deeply care about equity, and then they’re not willing to hold adults accountable for solving the problem, they don’t deeply care about equity. I want to see the action. What are you willing to do? Who are you willing to hold accountable?”
Literacy leadership: “What are we all going to do, and how are we going to hold ourselves accountable?” She adds, “The easiest way not to make too many people mad is to say the right things and do nothing, but that’s why kids can’t read.”

While Canter offers Mississippi as a model, she cautions, “The formula is easy to understand and hard, but possible, to follow: coherence in policy design, careful implementation work, collective leadership, and persistence, persistence, persistence.”

Local concerns. For a community know around the world for its exceptionalism in so many areas, this headline from the district’s website seems hardly possible: “Santa Barbara Unified Celebrates Test Score Growth: Literacy Rate Moves above 51%”

What that means is that half the students still cannot read. Suggesting that these test scores are remarkable or soaring is misleading at best. Fifty percent literacy proficiency is not an expected part of the highly touted and much-envied “Santa Barbara lifestyle.”

This collective shrug about low literacy has been the norm in the district for more than a generation. I remember a decade ago when district administrators tied to explain away poor reading results by pointing to what they called, “pockets of hope.”

For half of our children, those pockets remain empty and hope unfulfilled.

Here in Santa Barbara, we might boast a world-class university, but it’s off-limits to half the kids who graduate from our schools.

SBUSD’s adoption, in 2023, of a new curriculum based on the science of reading was a step in the right direction.

And the recent decision to require LETRS training for some elementary teachers is commendable. That intensive course of study is essential for educators and administrators to understand how the brain learns to read and why this research-proven instructional approach works. Developed by respected researcher Dr. Louisa Moats, it is one of the cornerstones for districts making progress. (In a local example, Peabody Charter School—which has required the training since 2022—boasts 71 percent literacy proficiency.)

The comments offered and questions posed by Canter are a good place to start in an evaluation of SBUSD’s approach to reading instruction. And many more arise:

For example:

State-mandated screening of reading difficulties is limited to grades K-2; what about screening for students in higher grades?
Or those who display characteristics of dyslexia in any grade?
What does remedial reading instruction look like for students in junior high and high school?
What is the role of Special Education in all this?
Where are the funding sources for the training and coaching?
What are the concerns expressed by classroom teachers and administrators about their implementation-related challenges—and how are they addressed?
What is the role of parents and of community members in supporting the district’s plans for literacy improvement?

A complete list would be much longer, but meaningful improvement requires analysis of at least these concerns, careful evaluation and candid discussion of the results.

Although the SBUSD school board has adopted literacy as a priority for the district, many questions remain about what exactly that means. But without clear, time-limited goals, strategies for achieving them, or measurements of accountability, it seems like more than a wish than a clear plan for success.

Bottom line. Literacy leadership is complex, and the message from Mississippi is that there are no miracles. The southern state’s successful route to meaningful improvement, however, can serve as a template if district leadership commits to comprehensive reform.

Two current school board seats—occupied by trustees Gabe Escobedo and Rose Munoz—will expire in December. Any candidate who runs ought to embrace a clear-eyed commitment to emulate the hard work accomplished in Mississippi—and then do it.

Reading is a right, not a privilege; it’s the public school’s responsibility to teach the skill that truly is fundamental.

As as the celebrated literacy expert Dr. Moats says, “we need to be outraged” about the current status quo.

Time was when one of my favorite SBUSD administrators—now long-gone—asserted, “Teaching all our students to read before graduation is a moral imperative.” That is a worthy, if belated, goal.

Cheri Rae, director of The Dyslexia Project, is a founding member of the Santa Barbara Reading Coalition (www.SBReads.org).

Image: The Dyslexia Project.

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