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The nation’s second largest school district isn’t exactly coming roaring back from the pandemic, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, commonly called the nation’s report card.
But the Los Angeles Unified School District also isn’t lagging behind either, according to the federal measure of math and reading skills, which, among other things, is used in assessments of districts and the creation of policy and research.
Nationwide, math and English test scores of fourth- and eighth graders largely held steady or declined on the 2024 edition of the exam, which is given every two years, with results released by the Department of Education last month.
That’s after scores across the board on the biennial federal exams took an historic nosedive in 2022, following two years of disruptions amid the coronavirus pandemic.
In that year, Los Angeles Unified avoided the declines that struck other districts, prompting Peggy Carr, commissioner for the National Center for Education Statistics, to praise the district as a place “of resilience amidst all the chaos of the pandemic.”
Did LAUSD retain its golden child status on the latest tests?
Here are five things to know about LA Unified’s performance on the federal exams.
1. LA Unified did reasonably well on the Nation’s Report Card
LAUSD posted mixed results on the 2024 federal exams, but generally posted smaller declines and larger gains compared to other large urban districts, the rest of the state and the nation as a whole.
LAUSD’s best subject on the federal exams was fourth-grade math, with scores up dramatically from 2022. L.A. Unified improved more than the state and the nation in this metric but the district’s score was still lower.
In 2024, 27% of L.A. fourth-graders achieved proficient scores in math, up from 20% in 2022, the last time the tests were given. Across California, proficiency rates rose from 30% to 35%; nationwide they rose from 35% to 39%.
Eighth-grade math scores were slightly higher in LAUSD in 2024, but not enough for a significant difference.
A quarter of L.A. fourth graders were proficient in reading in 2024 unchanged from 2022. Nationally, the proficiency rate fell two points from 2022, to 30%. California’s proficiency rate dropped 2 percentage points as well, to 29%.
Proficiency rates in eighth-grade reading took a dramatic fall for LAUSD in 2024, falling six points from 2022 to 22%. California’s eighth grade reading scores fell 2 points to 28%.
Morgan Polikoff, a professor of education policy at USC Rossier, said LA’s scores were mixed but generally suggest a positive trajectory for the district.
“There is some improvement, and I think that’s notable,” said Polikoff, “because I think a lot of places still are well behind.”
2. But the district failed to duplicate its 2022 success
The nation’s public schools saw historic declines on the federal exams administered in 2022, reflecting learning loss during disruptions caused by the pandemic. Scores fell in all four subject areas covered in the exam: math and reading for each fourth and second grade.
Los Angeles was a rare bright spot that year, with improvements or flat scores in three of four subject areas. Superintendent Alberto Carvalho attributed the rise to good online programming and high-impact tutoring. Some questioned the results.
This year LAUSD’s scores landed more in line with those of other districts, and declines in eighth grade reading in LA exceeded drops elsewhere.
However, Polikoff cautioned against reading too much into the results posted by any individual school district on the exams, including LAUSD.
“There’s sampling variation in these scores anytime you look at an individual jurisdiction,” he explained. “You don’t want to read too much into it.”
3. Other measures of LAUSD’s academic progress are mixed
The Los Angeles Unified School District showed significant improvements on state test scores released in October, outpacing gains made by the state, although most students still missed state proficiency standards.
On those state tests, LAUSD saw a 1.9% increase in students who met or exceeded standards for English language from the previous year. In math, the district saw a 2.3% increase, exceeding progress made across the state in each subject by a wide margin.
LAUSD also posted a record graduation rate of 87% in 2024, with the district’s graduation rate rising faster than that of the state as a whole.
A report released this month by the Education Recovery Scorecard, a data project led by a group of internationally recognized education experts, found that Los Angeles outperformed other districts in math and experienced smaller declines in reading since the pandemic.
Nationwide, those researchers found that the average American pupil is still half a year behind in math and reading, compared with children in 2019, and 94% of U.S. districts have not returned pre-pandemic reading and math levels.
4. Scores in LA and elsewhere were lower than hoped for
Although Los Angeles Unified made some gains on federal exams last year, the district’s failure to produce another superstar performance took some of the steam out of efforts by Carvalho to position the district as a juggernaut of pandemic recovery.
The district will not be celebrating the results released this month, the superintendent told the Los Angeles Times.
“My expectation is at some point we should be seeing increases across the board,” rather than the mixed results of 2024, Carvalho said.
National results on the exams were likewise discouraging, suggesting that recovery efforts have stalled in many U.S. districts, despite billions of dollars spent nationwide on pandemic recovery efforts.
5. LAUSD will train its focus on academic recovery, but still faces challenges
LAUSD has a variety of efforts meant to hasten the district’s recovery from the pandemic, ranging from a push for the science of reading, to efforts to boost attendance.
Some of those efforts have been showing results. But now LAUSD faces other pressing issues, including a $2.2 billion wildfire recovery and resiliency project brought on by the wildfires of January.
The new federal administration has some in LA Unified worried about issues such as immigration enforcement, and meanwhile the district is facing its old challenges of declining enrollments, school safety and more.
This article is part of a collaboration between The 74 and the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.