The Minnesota Department of Education recently released the 2024 reading and math proficiency rates for the state. Today, we examine the St. Cloud-area school districts.
First up, here is overall reading proficiency for each school district in the St. Cloud region:
All school districts at or below the red line have 50% or less of their students proficient in reading. According to the Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) only three of twenty-four school districts have more than 60% of students proficient in reading with the best school district of the bunch barely topping 70%.
In other words, 88% of school districts in the St. Cloud area have 60% or less of their students proficient in reading.
Math proficiency in the St. Cloud area is equally troubling.
Again, every school district at or below the red line has a math proficiency rate of 50% or less. A bit better than the reading proficiency rates shared earlier, there are five districts out of twenty-four that are above 60% math proficiency, but not a single school district achieves a 70% or better math proficiency rate for their students.
That means 79% of the school districts in the St. Cloud region have a 60% or less rate of math proficiency.
All of that is troubling, but is there improvement compared to reading and math proficiency rates in 2023? It’s a mixed bag with some school districts improving, but far too many districts are seeing proficiency rates still dropping.
Indeed, most school districts (58%) in the St. Cloud region saw their reading proficiency rates fall from the already low rates of 2023 – truly troubling.
Math proficiency was a hair better. Only 50% of the school districts in the St. Cloud area saw declining overall math proficiency rates.
As for how well high school students are prepared for life after graduation, it’s rather grim.
Just as in earlier graphs, the red line indicates a 50% reading proficiency rate. 79% of school districts in the St. Cloud area have less than 60% of their high school sophomores proficient in reading. Paynesville and St. Cloud are the lowest with 35% and 33% 10th-grade reading proficiency rates, respectively.
And how are high school juniors doing when it comes to math proficiency? Really not good.
In St. Cloud, the pool of future engineers and accountants will be quite small in the future.
According to MDE, not a single school district in the St. Cloud region has more than 60% of students proficient in math by 11th grade. Worse, 79% of the school districts have a math proficiency rate of 50% or less and 50% have a math proficiency rate of 40% or less. Rocori and St. Cloud school districts bring up the rear with an 18% and 17% 11th-grade math proficiency rate, respectively.
If you’d like to see how individual school districts are doing in 2024, please see the chart below.
The situation in St. Cloud is similar to the rest of Minnesota. Over the last ten years, we have seen a steady decline in reading and math proficiency, which was then accelerated during COVID.
If you believe it is unjust to keep kids trapped in failing schools simply due to their zip code, then you’ll want to join OAK as we work to advance school choice and Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) in Minnesota.
If proposed legislation was passed, students eligible for an ESA would receive $7,000 from the state to use for tuition at any school as well as for tutoring, extra-curricular activities, and other eligible education expenses.
To learn more about what you can do, please join OAK and Corey DeAngelis, America’s premier spokesman for school choice and ESAs, in St. Cloud on September 19, 2024 at the St. Cloud River’s Edge Convention Center for our next event!
You can learn more by clicking the image below. Otherwise, if you’d like to simply buy tickets (just $10 and includes a copy of DeAngelis’ book The Parent Revolution!), click here.
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Image Credit: McGhiever, CC BY-SA 4.0
