Saint Louis Public Schools has finished the first year of a districtwide phonics overhaul and is pointing to early, if modest, gains in elementary reading growth. District leaders say more young students are keeping pace with peers than before, even as most kindergarten and early-elementary students still fall short of the district’s typical-growth benchmark.
What changed in classrooms
After trying out several curricula, the district shifted to a structured literacy model that puts systematic phonics at the center of early reading instruction. As reported by 95 Percent Group, teachers in grades K–5 now teach a dedicated 30-minute phonics block every day, while middle-school students spend short daily periods on morphology and syllable work to strengthen their decoding skills.
Early results and what they mean
District data show the share of students hitting the student-growth-percentile benchmark rose from the 2023–24 baseline to 2025–26 by four percentage points in kindergarten, three points in first grade and seven points in second grade. Even with those bumps, fewer than half of early-grade students reached the typical-growth mark: 46 percent in kindergarten, 28 percent in first grade and 30 percent in second grade, according to St. Louis Magazine, which reviewed district figures.
District officials describe the results as movement in the right direction rather than a full-blown turnaround. They argue that sustained gains in decoding will be needed before the district can expect to see broader jumps in reading comprehension scores.
Pilot schools, vendor and spending
The pilot, conducted at four schools, helped the district settle on a single vendor and scale up supports, according to 95 Percent Group, which reports that pilot campuses saw strong English language arts growth and fewer students needing intensive reading intervention. Spending on the program shows up in SLPS payment records, including invoices to the vendor listed in the district’s July 2025 consolidated check register.
State law and the bigger shift
The SLPS move is part of a broader shift toward structured literacy policies tied to the “science of reading.” In Missouri, the state’s Reading Success guidance and SB 681 set expectations for foundational reading assessments and supports, and a 2025 law further tightened rules around using discredited three-cueing methods as a primary approach, according to reporting by the Missouri Independent.
Union reaction and what comes next
The city teachers union has pushed back on the idea that phonics alone will fix reading outcomes, pressing for more time and resources devoted to independent reading and for broader community efforts to get books into students’ homes. “If you don’t increase the amount of independent reading that students do outside of school, they’re never going to read on grade level,” AFT Local 420 President Ray Cummings told St. Louis Magazine.
District leaders, for their part, say phonics instruction is a foundation on which broader literacy skills will be built, and they expect comprehension measures to rise over several years as decoding improves and is reinforced in classrooms.
Officials say the work will continue into the 2026–27 school year with ongoing teacher training and data monitoring, and that parents and community organizations will be drawn in to support young readers. The early gains suggest progress, they say, but also underscore that pulling up reading scores across the district will require sustained effort and time.
