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Oregon Kids Read, an advocacy network calling for the state to improve how it supports young readers, warns that a bill this session intended to improve Oregon’s 2023 early literacy initiative may have unintended effects.
The advocacy group partnered with Oregon’s American Civil Liberties Union and four other organizations to criticize House Bill 3040, warning that amendments to the bill don’t do enough to intervene in the schools most at need.
In a May 27 letter to the leaders of the Legislature’s Joint Ways and Means Committee and its Subcommittee on Education, the groups write that the bill must prioritize schools with the lowest rates of proficiency in reading and ensure tracking of how spending influences student outcomes. To target the 42 schools these groups term “most neglected” (lowest in third to fifth grade reading proficiency since 2018), they propose allocating $17 million to both teacher training and high-impact tutoring.
They write that the Oregon Department of Education must rethink how it currently prioritizes schools for funding; right now, the state allows money to be prioritized to any school that has literacy proficiency rates that have not recovered to pre-pandemic levels.
Literacy advocates say the provision applies to the vast majority of schools statewide and prevents schools that have been failing the longest—which typically have larger shares of low-income students and students of color—from getting the resources they need. As it stands, HB 3040 makes no direct commitment to some of Oregon’s worst-performing schools.
As the Oregon Capital Chronicle reported in April, Gov. Tina Kotek is asking the Legislature for $100 million more in grant funding for the early literacy initiative, on top of the $90 million it received in 2023. Advocacy groups warn that the money could be spent for naught if it’s not targeted.
“Families are calling on Ways and Means to use its funding oversight to prioritize students and schools that struggle the most with reading achievement,” Angela Uherbelau, founder of Oregon Kids Read, said in a statement.