K-12 Education Expert Karen Vaites On Reversing America’s Decline in Reading Achievement

Since 1969, the National Assessment Governing Board has been conducting the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP)—the “Nation’s Report Card”. In 2024, fourth grade reading scores hit their lowest mark in 20 years, with 40% of tested students scoring “below NAEP basic”; eighth grade reading scores hit their lowest mark ever, with 33% of tested students scoring below basic. Some of the blame for the low scores goes to the pandemic: from 2019 to 2024, 49 of 50 states lost ground in reading achievement, with Maine students leading the pack by dropping a full grade level on average.

But not all the news is bad. Some states—four in particular—weathered the pandemic comparatively well. That, in and of itself, likely isn’t surprising. What likely is surprising is which states proved abnormally resilient: Louisiana, Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama.

And that’s why I wanted to talk to Karen Vaites, the writer behind the School Yourself newsletter and the founder of the Curriculum Insight Project (both School Yourself and the Curriculum Insight Project can be found here on Substack). Karen, the mother of an elementary school student and daughter of a principal-turned-curriculum director, didn’t set out to become a K-12 education expert and advocate, but once a path presented itself, she leaned in. After beginning her career in the technology startup world, she served as chief marketing officer for a series of three K-12 startups, then shifted full-time into advocacy work.

Over the course of an information-packed hour—Karen knows more about K-12 education policy than I do about, well, maybe anything—we discussed the “Southern Surge,” why the backslide on reading scores started well before the pandemic, No Child Left Behind and Common Core, the impact of technology on classroom learning, what the data said about keeping schools open during the pandemic, and plenty more.