Reading Programs’ Effects on the Achievement Gap

Public project summary

This paper explores the causes, impacts, and attempted solutions of literacy development and the literacy achievement gap between students from historically underrepresented ethnic groups and students from other ethnic groups. It details the plan for a study that would research features in literacy programs and how they affect this achievement gap, as well as how effective these features are in addressing the literacy achievement gap. This research aimed to discover reading programs that can help decrease this achievement gap in the Palo Alto Unified School District. It found that the best feature of a reading program is the student being able to choose their own books, and reading with an older mentor is also a beneficial feature, while having students read a digital book on their own is not beneficial to decreasing this achievement gap.