Like all educators, the Learning Forward community was disappointed by the latest results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, also known as the “Nation’s Report Card,” that were released on January 29th. The fact that nearly all states saw student reading and math scores decrease or remain flat from 2022 levels means that our schools have not yet achieved the post-pandemic academic recovery we have all been working towards. They signal a need to double down on the pockets of success we have seen in recent months and years and call for a united and comprehensive response to support all educators and students with science-based instructional materials and learning approaches.

At Learning Forward, our focus is on student success. Our method is high-quality professional learning that improves teaching and leadership. Teachers and principals are the leading in-school factors in student success, and the path forward for improving student achievement has to start by honoring them, acknowledging the complexity of students’ needs today, and supporting them to address those needs. Ongoing, sustained professional learning that includes mentoring for new teachers, coaching, practice, peer collaboration, and leadership development, is essential.

Research on the impact of high-quality professional learning gives us hope for reversing the NAEP trends and improving student learning and achievement, even in the face of challenges including the kinds of pandemic-induced learning gaps that the study’s 4th and 8th graders experienced from the time they were in kindergarten and 4th grade, respectively. Studies show that when education systems invest in high-quality professional learning, coupled with other resources including high-quality curriculum, students have better outcomes in the very areas cast in the NAEP spotlight: math and reading.

For example, math test scores in a set of Maryland classrooms significantly improved after teachers began participating in Learning Forward’s Curriculum-Based Professional Learning Network. The results are striking: in Montgomery County classrooms where teachers did a collaborative deep dive into a high-quality math curriculum, students increased their proficiency scores on district tests from an average of 9% to 52% in just one marking period.

In reading, Chicago Public Schools students are performing better now that the district has committed to providing teachers with extensive professional learning centered in high-quality curriculum: 31% of elementary school students in Chicago Public Schools were proficient in reading in 2024, compared to 26% in 2023 and 28% in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic. An independent study also found that Chicago students’ reading skills are recovering from the pandemic more quickly than those in most other large districts.

High-quality professional learning in these districts and others helps teachers and leaders stay current with evolving research and align their practices with studies showing what works. Instructional methods and curriculum change over time because our understanding of how students learn changes, thanks to neuroscience and other fields. Students also change as a result of societal trends, historical events like the pandemic, and environments and tools like technology that change and change us.

Even great educators need professional learning to provide the best education for students amid those changes. A case in point is a consensus on the need for changes in how students learn to read to align with the neuroscience of literacy. Science of reading legislation has now been passed in most U.S. states: As of 2024, 34 states require training, beginning with K-4 teachers and administrators, 26 states require literacy coaching, and 42 require that educator preparation programs align with the science of reading.

These trends in literacy professional learning are encouraging. They are likely too recent to have impacted the students in the 2024 NAEP data, according to comments at the NAEP town hall event made by Martin West, a member of the independent governing board that sets policy for NAEP and a professor at Harvard. The data we do have, from Chicago and other districts like Charleston, South Carolina, strongly suggest that districts should continue and expand their professional learning efforts to improve literacy.

It’s important to note that investments in professional learning will lead to improved results for students only if the professional learning is high-quality. This is why Learning Forward maintains the Standards for Professional Learning, which outline the content, processes, and conditions necessary for successful professional learning. A meta-analysis conducted by the American Institutes for Research shows that high-quality professional learning aligned to the Standards for Professional Learning leads to improvements in instruction that in turn lead to improvements in student learning.

As indicated in the standards, professional learning that makes a difference is systemic and strategic. One-off, piecemeal professional development sessions will not lead to the results our students need and deserve. Systemic approaches include career-long support for teachers and leaders, district-wide plans and resources that are aligned with academic improvement goals, and state-wide initiatives that build systems of support.

For an example of a state system, we can look to Louisiana, which provided one of the few encouraging results in the NAEP data. Louisiana fourth graders performed better in reading, on average, in 2024 than in 2022. The study did not allow researchers to examine the reasons for changes in performance, so while we can’t claim causality, it is worth noting that the state of Louisiana has made significant investments in professional learning for new teachers.

In 2014, the Louisiana Department of Education launched the Believe and Prepare pilot to provide aspiring teachers a full year of practice under an expert mentor to ensure that new teachers had the tools and support to succeed from year one. In 2016, the education agency selected Learning Forward to design and facilitate a mentor teacher training program that provided expert teachers across the state with tools and skills to more effectively support teachers in their systems through their first three years of teaching. After this three-year partnership concluded, outcomes from the program showed that over all cohorts from 2017 to 2020, 95% of participating mentors reported feeling “prepared and confident to mentor resident and novice teachers.” Believe and Prepare, which became mandatory in 2018, has shown positive results, including higher percentages of new teachers staying in Louisiana schools.

As state, district, and school systems make investments in high-quality professional learning, the NAEP results can be useful for determining where to focus professional learning effort and resources. In both math and reading, the performance of students at the lowest levels of proficiency declined, meaning that struggling students are worse off than they were two years ago, while highly proficient students performed better than in the past. It would be wise for education systems to invest in professional learning that builds teachers’ knowledge of and strategies for supporting struggling learners.

The call for high-quality professional learning is not new. But we are encouraged by the spread of meaningful learning approaches for educators and growing research on their positive impact. They give us hope that we can change the troubling trends we’ve been seeing in NAEP scores for several years. With a highly effective workforce of teachers, leaders, and support staff at all schools, whether they be traditional public, charter, private, or other, we can ensure a bright future for every child.