Report: The Impact of Supplemental Literacy Courses for Struggling Ninth-Grade Readers

According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), just over 70 percent of students nationally arrive in high school with reading skills that are below proficient”. Of these students, nearly half do not exhibit even partial mastery of the knowledge and skills that are fundamental to proficient work at grade level.

To help fill this gap and to provide evidence-based guidance to practitioners, the U.S.Department of Education initiated the Enhanced Reading Opportunities (ERO) study — a demonstration and rigorous evaluation of supplemental literacy programs targeted to ninth grade students whose reading skills are at least two years below grade level.5