For roughly a decade now, reading outcomes have plummeted in Oklahoma. In 2015, national tests showed Oklahoma fourth-grade students performed above the national average, but in the most recent round of tests, Oklahoma students’ performance was among the worst in the nation.

Now, two lawmakers want to reverse that trend by making reading instruction a major focus of the state’s K-12 school system.

State Rep. Rob Hall, R-Tulsa, and state Sen. Micheal Bergstrom, R-Adair, have filed legislation in both chambers to address what they call Oklahoma’s reading crisis.

House Bill 2944, by Hall and Bergstrom, would create the Oklahoma Reading Excellence through Accountability, Development, and Standards (READS) Act. Senate Bill 1271, by the same authors, is identical legislation, ensuring that reading reform can be considered in both chambers in the 2026 legislative session.

Both bills would require early intervention for K-3rd students who have a reading deficiency, reimplement the policy of retaining third graders who do not read on grade level, and assign literacy coaches to districts with low reading scores.

“Reading is the foundation on which all other learning rests,” Hall said. “If we do not ensure students have sufficient reading skills by third grade, we are hampering their ability to achieve academically. This could ultimately lead to fewer opportunities for them in the workforce and their careers.”

“Oklahoma is failing our children. By almost every metric, our state is facing a literacy crisis, and it is our kids and our grandkids who are going to suffer,” said Bergstrom, a former public-school teacher. “On top of that, this could severely hamper our state’s ability to compete and prosper.”

The bills are modeled after Mississippi’s Literacy-Based Promotion Act (LBPA), approved in 2013. Since the implementation of the LBPA, Mississippi has climbed from 49th to ninth for fourth-grade reading, as measured by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). 

“The reforms we are proposing have a proven track record of success. In fact, the groundwork was laid down in the Strong Reader’s Act,” Bergstrom said, referencing existing Oklahoma law. “However, if we want to see significant progress, we must pass these changes and stick to them. Oklahoma cannot afford another decade of illiteracy.”

The Oklahoma READS Act would increase opportunities to screen public-school students in kindergarten and first, second, and third grades for reading deficiencies throughout the school year.

Additionally, the measure would require that if a student’s reading performance is not on grade level, the student will remain in the third grade, beginning in the 2027-2028 school year. Under the bill, those students will be provided with intensive intervention services. The legislation does include specific “good cause” exemptions under which a school district may promote a student to fourth grade, including students with individualized education programs (IEPs) and English language learners who have had less than two years of instruction.

The Oklahoma READS Act also requires the State Department of Education (SDE) to employ and assign literacy coaches to districts identified by SDE as having many students who received low reading assessment scores. 

“We have an opportunity for serious gains in childhood literacy,” Hall said. “Reforms and results in other states have shown that widespread illiteracy is a policy choice. We must make the necessary policy changes here in Oklahoma to put our students on a trajectory of success.”

Spending Up, Reading Down

While Oklahoma fourth-grade student performance on the NAEP reading test was above the national average in 2015, it is now far below that average despite massive spending increases in recent years.

The gap between the national average NAEP score for 4th-grade students on the reading test and the Oklahoma average was the second largest recorded in the history of the test, which was first administered in Oklahoma in 1998.

The only gap larger than the 2024 results was generated on the 2022 version of the NAEP test and narrowed slightly in 2024, thanks only to the national average declining by two points and not because Oklahoma’s performance improved. In fact, Oklahoma’s average dropped another point.

NAEP tests show that only 23 percent of Oklahoma 4th-grade students scored at or above proficient, meaning they are meeting grade-level expectations. In comparison, the test showed that 33 percent of students were performing at grade level in 2015.

According to financial data reported by schools to the state’s Oklahoma Cost Accounting System (OCAS), Oklahoma public schools received $9,600,703,488 in new revenue in the 2023-2024 school year, an increase of $3.3 billion compared to the $6,300,400,107 reported by schools during the 2017-2018 school year.

On a per-student basis, Oklahoma public-school revenue surged 51 percent from the 2017-2018 school year to the 2023-2024 school year, reaching $13,736 per student, a sum that significantly exceeds the average private-school tuition rate in Oklahoma, according to recent surveys.

When the Edunomics Lab at Georgetown University analyzed “return on investment” (ROI) data from 2013 to 2024, tracking NAEP 4th-grade reading and 8th-grade math scores alongside per-pupil spending, they found that Oklahoma’s per-pupil spending increased 47 percent during that decade, but NAEP scores in both reading and math were far lower today than in 2013. Oklahoma’s spending increase far outpaced inflation during that time.

In Oklahoma, Edunomics noted, “Reading 4th grade scores fell through the decade and continue to decline even as spending increased.”

The Oklahoma READS Act is eligible for consideration during the upcoming legislative session, which begins Feb. 2, 2026.