Monthly Update

October 6, 2023

The rocket science behind reading

If a picture is worth a thousand words, and a child learns to read using cues from images on the page, what happens when they encounter books with only text?

JoLynn Aldinger, who taught kindergarten through 2nd grade for 20 years, told Education Week, "If you're reading a book about the life cycle of a sunflower, you can look at the picture if you don't know how to sound it out." She explained that when there are no more pictures and students aren't able to decode words, students just have to guess.

Decoding is a component of a body of research called "The Science of Reading," an evidence-based approach to improve literacy outcomes. It's not a product or a program but rather knowledge of how the brain develops language comprehension and word recognition.

In the past five years, 30 states have passed laws to require evidence-based reading instruction. Kansas and Missouri have earmarked funds to train teachers in the science of reading using a program called created by Dr. Louisa Moats called LETRS , which stands for "Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling."

Educators receive in-depth training around phonemic awareness, phonics and word study, vocabulary, fluency, comprehension, and assessment. Moats describes teaching reading as "rocket science" based on the hundreds of studies on how the "brain's activation patterns or measures split-second reactions to speech or print." But asserts that "reading failure can be prevented in all but a small percentage of children with serious learning disorders."

The Show-Me State has launched the Missouri Read, Lead, Exceed initiative, which provides LETRS training to K-5 educators. According to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, more than 10,000 educators have already participated in the training.

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, only 30 percent of Missouri students performed at or above the NAEP Proficient level in 2022. Kansas was about the same at 31 percent.

For a deeper dive into the history of literacy instruction and why we are shifting to a new approach, check out "Sold a Story: How Teaching Kids to Read Went So Wrong" from APM Reports.

About Aligned

Aligned is the only state-wide non-profit, nonpartisan business group working in Kansas and Missouri on educational issues impacting the full development of our children, from supporting high-quality early learning to solid secondary programs that provide rigorous academic programs and real-world learning opportunities.

Our vision is that our public education systems in Kansas and Missouri have the resources and flexibility to prepare students to pursue the future of their choice.

We are currently focused on education policies that will strengthen early childhood education, teacher recruitment and retention, and school finance reform.

Learn more about our work.

Dr. Kari Monsees, the deputy commissioner of the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education presents budget estimates for FY25 to the Joint Committee on Education in September.

Missouri News

Stagnant per student funding sees big bump

The State Board of Education approved a budget request for the PK-12 foundation formula totaling $120,599,628, which will appear as a new decision item in the governor’s FY25 budget. Upon approval of the Missouri General Assembly, public schools can expect an increase in the state adequacy target from $6,375 to $6,760 for FY25 and $7,145 for FY26. The $4 billion formula payment represents the single biggest line item in the state budget.

Why the bump?

When the state implemented the latest iteration of the school improvement program (MSIP 6), it changed the composition of the “high-performance districts” that DESE uses to set per-student funding targets. “With MSIP 6, we’ve got a more selective pool of districts and charter schools in that grouping. In the past, there were many districts above 90%. With MSIP 6, it’s a much smaller list meeting that high standard and impacting the overall SAT (state adequacy target),” explains Dr. Kari Monsees, Deputy Commissioner of Financial and Administrative Services for the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

Dr. Monsees added that the FY26 increase in SAT will cost $300M.

State business chamber sounds alarm on child care crisis

The Missouri Independent reported on the end of federal pandemic relief that has buoyed child care operations for the past couple of years. “Now some of that money is going away. American Rescue Plan Act stabilization funds — $24 billion distributed by states that allowed child care to continue for 9.6 million children — will run out Sept. 30,” writes Casey Quinlan.

At the Missouri Chamber’s annual workforce conference later this month, Lt. Governor Mike Kehoe will address the child care crisis during his keynote address.

The Missouri Independent also reports that Missouri Chamber President Dan Mehan shook his finger at a state senator for not allowing a tax credit package for child care centers to come up for a vote. “You can’t go to work if your kids have nowhere to go,” Mehan told the crowd of about 100 gathered at the University of Missouri’s Center for Family Policy and Research. “Due to knuckleheads doing filibusters – Bill Eigel – it didn’t come up for a vote.”

Meanwhile, the Bluegrass state found an innovative way to address the child care supply shortage, and it’s working.

DESE awards first round of new Pre-K grants

Last session, the Missouri General Assembly appropriated funding for two new grant programs to serve preschoolers from families with low-incomes. Good news - DESE has announced the first round of Missouri Quality Pre-K (MOQPK) grantees which include more than 3,000 seats for 4-year-old in public schools and funding for 4-year olds in private provider settings.

In other news

Kansas News

Task force tackles preschool programming improvements

Amanda Petersen, who serves as the director of the Kansas State Department of Education's (KSDE) Early Childhood team and as a member of Governor Kelly's Early Childhood Transition Task Force, provided a glimpse of recommendations that may be coming when the task force meets later this month. New opportunities to streamline programming include:

Enhancing preschool funding via the school finance formula instead of the Kansas Preschool Pilot grant
Expanding preschool-aged-at-risk eligibility to include preschool students with family income qualifying for reduced-price meals
Housing all home visiting/parent education programming within a single agency

Kansas State professor publishes nationwide teacher shortage data

A professor at Kansas State University offers a little nuance to the teacher shortage crisis. In addition to persistent vacancies in the U.S., more than 160,000 teaching positions are filled by under-qualified teachers. Dr. Tuan Nguyen is a former middle and high school math teacher and now studies the teacher labor market . Dr. Nguyen and his colleagues counted more than 36,500 vacancies in 37 states and D.C. for the 2021-22 school year. They found that teacher shortages had grown by 35% to more than 49,000 vacancies. In addition, according to his research published last month, there are 1,918 under qualified teachers in Kansas and 3,089 in Missouri.

Axios highlighted Dr. Nguyen's work in a recent article.

In other news

Making our way to Music City

The Aligned team is Nashville-bound!

While we can't carry a tune, we aren't afraid to sing about some of our recent wins with our education policy colleagues from around the country at the annual PIE Summit. Since 2017, Aligned has been a member of the PIE (Policy Innovators in Education) network.

A little about PIE...

"PIE Network was founded in 2006 by a small group of 12 state advocacy organizations and national partners based on a recognition that a nascent education reform movement would be stronger by leveraging connections and collaboration to take great work to scale. Today, the Network is a powerful collection of more than 150 local, state, and national education advocacy, and policy organizations in 34 states and D.C. who represent students, families, educators, business and civic leaders, researchers and policy experts who share a commitment to core values and policy pillars and are working to transform our education system so that every student can succeed."

While Nashville is always a good time, we are excited to see what innovative ideas we can bring back to Kansas and Missouri.

We won't send postcards but we promise to share a few pics next month.

Enjoy October - arguably the most beautiful month of the year in the midwest!