Why did the NYC Standardized Test Scores Dive?

Standardized testing has a long history, a very long history.

China has the world’s oldest and most influential history of standardized testing, originating with the ancient imperial civil service examinations (keju) over 2,000 years ago. This merit-based tradition evolved into the modern Gaokao (National College Entrance Examination), shaping global concepts of educational testing and social mobility.

The first law signed by Bush 2 was No Child Left Behind (NCLB) requiring states to administer annual reading and math tests in grades three through eight, and disaggregate the score by group and publish the results. States had to provide academic assistance to the lowest achieving schools.  Senator Ted Kennedy was a chief architect and champion of the landmark bipartisan law working alongside President G. W. Bush to sign the education reform into law in January 2002.

School districts responded as expected, searching the universe for the magic bullet, As the frustration mounted over the years President Obama reauthorized NCLB with a new name and some tweaks, now the Every Child Succeeds Act (ESSA).

Every state created their own tests and every school district purchased their own proprietary testing materials.  

The National Assessment of Educational  Progress (NAEP). administered every three years is considered the gold standard. TUDA (Trends in Urban District Assessment also administered every third year in a range of subjects, about seventy cities participate).  NAEP and TUDA results are substantially different than the state standardized test results.

NYC Chancellor Farina, was a fan of Lucy Calkin’s ,

Lucy Calkins’ theory is rooted in the “balanced literacy” and “whole language” approach, which she developed through the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project at Columbia University. Her philosophy emphasizes that children can learn to read and write naturally through rich, meaningful experiences with literature, rather than through rigid, systematic instruction.

The Reading Wars exploded, the “answer” was the so-called Science of Reading, aka, phonics driven instruction, a new mayor, a new chancellor, a new magic bullet.  

I wrote a widely read blog re The Reading Wars, read here.

Mayor Adams required all schools adopt phonics centric reading programs, NYC Reads.

Grounded in extensive research, NYC Reads ensures that all children receive the most effective literacy instruction rooted in the Science of Reading. NYC Reads is more than a curriculum rollout; it represents a systemwide investment in excellent instruction, responsive support, and sustained community engagement.

The release of the Spring, 2026 Standardized Test scores, dramatic drops in scores.

What happened?

The Department scrambling, who is to blame?

“The Department takes this decline seriously and will conduct a detailed analysis to better understand where students are experiencing challenges, which student groups and communities have been most affected, and where additional support and resources are needed,” said JP O’Hare, a spokesperson for the department.

A Harvard professor serving on a panel to evaluate the tests found the results “noisy,”  

While governors and mayors and superintendents continue to search for the magic bullet we know that the search is futile, the magic bullet is a dud.

Teaching is not tightening bolts on an assembly line, teaching is a complex art, children differ, what “works” one day fails the next, colleagues collaborate, schools are cultures, 

Controversial education initiatives enacted in recent years, like the NYC Reads literacy program launched under former Mayor Eric Adams, have stunted students’ growth, argued Eric Nadelstern, deputy schools chancellor under then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

“There is no one-way for all kids to learn how to read,” Nadelstern told The Post.

“If you try a one-size-fits-all in a city as diverse as New York, — where students have such different needs and ways of learning and teachers have such different needs and ways of teaching — you’re gonna wind up alienating the staff and they’re gonna implement the program poorly,” he said.

“If you allow them to do what they do best — that is to determine how the students they know by name and family and neighborhood can learn best — they will do whatever is necessary to make sure their kids succeed.”

Mary Vaccaro, vice president of education for the United Federation of Teachers union, also blamed changes in curriculum and teaching strategies, like “NY Inspires” – which allows students to graduate through avenues other than passing standardized tests like the Regents.

“We have to refocus on what we know works in literacy – a clear plan, a tailored science of reading curriculum, and meaningful professional development for educators. That recipe yields results,” Vaccaro said.

“This past school year, the system abandoned that approach and, with no real plan in place, simply piled on additional programs, assessments, consultant’s recommendations and curriculum in the hopes that ‘more’ would equal better, and we lost ground.”

The Research Alliance for NYC Schools at NYU should be tasked with exploring “what went wrong” the Alliance’s role, as well as taking a deeper dive, are uniquely suited,

The Alliance,

• Conducts rigorous, applied research in collaboration with policymakers, educators, and other stakeholders;
• Maintains a unique archive of longitudinal data on NYC schools and communities, to support ongoing research; and
• Communicates the results of our work to multiple audiences here in NYC and around the nation.

I’d ask the Alliance to explore, Do “high collaboration” schools, as evidenced by School Surveys, have better academic outcomes?

Do the Affinity District schools have better academic outcomes than similarly situated schools,

Identify “high poverty risk load” schools with better outcomes, and explore why?

Some will claim the tests were not designed to test the curriculum or the standards; however the test creation process is extremely detailed, see the process here.

What we can anticipate is many pointing fingers, and the fingers will crumble as the next crisis emerges.

Nadelstern and Vaccaro are right!  Does it matter?

Will the Chancellor and the Mayor agree that the current top down school management model is not working and collaborate with parents, teachers and school leaders to create a bottom up model, supporting clusters of schools, respecting and enhancing decisions made by those closest to students, a system that is working in the Affinity District and PROSE schools?