Georgia Looks to Early Literacy Reform to Improve Reading Outcomes

While a great deal of focus on education policy in Georgia has revolved around school choice policies and education finance, there are significant changes taking place inside the classroom as well.

Georgia has joined several states in addressing early literacy, that fundamental period for students that typically begins around age 5. Students who fall behind in reading early are far less likely to graduate from high school. The need is urgent: In the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), just 30% of Georgia fourth graders rated “proficient” or better in reading.  Georgia’s average score was roughly in line with the national average, which is no real consolation when the national benchmark still leaves too many students below basic reading proficiency.

In this year’s legislative session, the General Assembly passed House Bill 1193, the Georgia Early Literacy Act of 2026. This bill expands the use of literacy coaches, strengthens direction around early reading instruction and pushes earlier identification of students who are falling behind.

This effort is part of a broad shift in education policy. States across the country—especially Georgia’s neighbors in the South—have recently moved toward early reading reforms that emphasize structured literacy, explicit attention to phonics instruction, stronger teacher support and earlier intervention for struggling students. The best-known example of this is Mississippi, where literacy reforms helped produce some of the nation’s most notable reading gains.

Mississippi offers an example of how literacy-based reforms can improve outcomes. Its 2013 Literacy-Based Promotion Act emphasized early reading and paired it with classroom support such as universal screeners, diagnostic assessments, intensive interventions for students with reading deficiencies and literacy coaches in targeted schools. This became a blueprint for similar reforms and the catalyst for what came to be known as the “Mississippi Miracle,” or the rapid improvement of its students’ performance.

After Mississippi adopted the Literacy-Based Promotion Act, its reading performance improved markedly over time. Its NAEP scores for fourth grade reading climbed from 49th in the country in 2013 to ninth by 2024. The state also now consistently ranks highly in reading scores among economically disadvantaged and minority students.

Louisiana pursued similar literacy reforms including requiring a statewide K-3 literacy screener, offering free science-of-reading training for teachers and leaders, and providing guidance on the use of literacy coaches. These reforms also focused on moving away from cueing-based reading instruction, which relies on context such as pictures and other clues instead of phonics to teach words. Its fourth grade NAEP reading score rose from 210 in 2019 to 216 in 2024, making it one of only two states where fourth graders outperformed their pre-pandemic reading and math results.

Another example is Tennessee. The Tennessee Literacy Success Act requires districts to use foundational literacy instruction with a phonics-based approach, administer universal K-3 screeners, adopt aligned instructional materials and submit literacy plans for state approval. Tennessee’s 2024 implementation review reported that English language arts scores and universal screener results continued positive trends.

Efforts like these are not a one-to-one comparison with Georgia’s literacy effort. In fact, HB 1193 is not Georgia’s only recent literacy-based reform (take 2018’s HB 538, for example). It’s also not true that such legislation is a magic formula for success. Some commenters, such as the Progressive Policy Institute’s director of education policy Rachel Canter, have recently pointed out that Mississippi’s achievements did not come from teaching phonics alone. Rather, they came from a broader raising of standards that emphasized accountability and featured disciplined implementation.

Canter specifically mentioned Georgia’s prior efforts to implement literacy standards as having implementation issues. She said Georgia did not carefully narrow the reading screeners it approved, and that the Georgia Department of Education’s original list had 16 options of widely varying quality. She added that this problem helped prompt a 2024 bill aimed at limiting the approved tests.

She also asserted that the Georgia Department of Education has been reluctant to force districts to change their practices. In other words, Georgia adopted parts of the Mississippi approach on paper without the same level of accountability and implementation discipline.

Canter also notes that Georgia lawmakers have recognized some of those implementation problems and tried to address them through follow-up legislation. Indeed, HB 1193 requires unified literacy plans across districts and attaches stronger consequences to early intervention and promotion decisions.

The attention to literacy-based learning in state policy is certainly vulnerable to overreaction. American Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow Robert Pondiscio noted that “miracle” stories are symptomatic of a fad-driven culture in education, and that they, “depend on the premise that success lies not in the slow work of building systems, but in the one magical lever we have somehow failed to discover and pull.” Canter has even described the Magnolia State’s progress as more of a “Mississippi marathon” in recognition of the long-term dedication to reform that it represents.

While such cautions and qualifications are critical, they should not obscure the fact that literacy-based learning has proven to be a key piece in improving student outcomes, so long as it is complemented by disciplined implementation and persistent accountability. Without a foundation of reading proficiency, too many Georgia students risk falling behind for years to come.