New York City Public School elementary students saw an overall uptick in their reading and math scores during the 2024-25 school year, according to the citywide Spring Screener results published by the city on Wednesday.
The percentage of students scoring above the national median for reading increased by 2.5 points — from 39.1% of students in 2024 to 41.6% in 2025. For math, the percentage of students scoring above the national median increased by 3.2 percentage points — from 35.2% in 2024 to 38.4% in 2025.
“These increases reflect accelerated growth in the percentage of students above the national median compared to previous years,” wrote Mayor Eric Adams and Public Schools Chancellor Melissa Aviles Ramos in a joint statement on July 2. “Our administration is committed to continuing this critical work next school year, as we ensure every student has the education and skills needed to thrive.”
Expansion of reading and math programs
The report comes after Adams and Aviles Ramos announced in April that they would be expanding the pilot NYC Reads and NYC Solves programs to 186 additional schools across 14 districts. The expansion, set to go into effect for the 2025-26 school year, will bring the programs to over 490,000 students.
Adams launched NYC Reads and NYC Solves in 2023 with then-Chancellor of the City Department of Education David Banks. A 2023 report by EdTrust-New York revealed that public school students in the city were facing an “early literacy crisis” and called for “immediate solutions” to comparatively low literacy rates compared to some other states.
“While New York struggles with an early education literacy crisis, the widespread use of non-evidence-based practices in teaching reading across the state is compounding the problem,” the report reads. “Worse yet, the state’s earliest learners are being denied access to proven resources shown to boost reading skills.”
No child left behind in progress
The data set published Wednesday shows that increases in math and reading proficiency were reflected across race, ethnicity, and gender.
The percentage of Asian students performing above the national median for reading scores increased an average of 1.6 points, the percentage of Black students performing above the median increased an average of 2.6 points, the percentage for Hispanic students increased an average of 2.6 points, and the percentage for white students increased an average of 2.6 points.
The increases in math scores saw similar improvements for K-5 students. The percentage of Asian students performing above the national median increased an average of 2.3 points, the percentage of Black students performing higher than the median increased an average of 3.1 points, the percentage of Hispanic students increased an average of 3.4 points, and the percentage of white students increased an average of 3.5 points.
The 2024-25 school year also saw an increase in the percentage of students with disabilities performing above national median test scores, with a 1 point increase in students with disabilities grades K-2 performing above the national math median since 2023-24 and a 1.2 point increase for reading. Grades 3-5 saw a 2.1 point increase in math scores above the national median for students with disabilities and a 1.9 point increase for reading.
For multilingual students in grades 3-5 learning English, the percentage of test scores above the national median for math rose by 2.5 points since the previous school year, while the percentage performing above the national average in reading rose by 1.3 points. For multilingual students in grades K-2 learning English, the percentage of math test scores above the national median rose by 0.9 points, and the percentage of reading scores above the national average declined by 0.1 points.
