Ranking Member Scott Statement on the 2025 Nation’s Report Card

Ranking Member Scott Statement on the 2025 Nation's Report Card

WASHINGTON - House Education and Workforce Committee Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott (VA-03) issued the following statement after the National Center for Education Statistics released the 2025 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) results for 8th grade science and 12th grade math and reading.

"The latest Nation's Report Card offers a troubling confirmation of what educators, students, and families have long been signaling: our schools were struggling to improve student outcomes long before the COVID-19 pandemic and are still struggling to fully recover from the academic disruptions of the pandemic. These declines reinforce the urgent need for sustained federal investment in academic recovery and educational equity.

"Unfortunately, instead of responding with the urgency that our nation's learning crisis demands, the Trump Administration is pushing forward with its reckless efforts to dismantle the Department of Education, including critical offices such as the Institute for Education Sciences (IES). IES is responsible for evaluating and assessing learning styles to improve educational outcomes for all students and producing the Nation's Report Card. Eliminating the very agency responsible for supporting public schools and enforcing civil rights protections of students will only deepen the achievement gaps identified by this assessment.

"Moreover, Congressional Republicans passed, and the President signed into law, the 'Big Ugly Law,' which will create the first nationwide school voucher program, effectively diverting taxpayer funding and resources away from public schools. An analysis by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy found that this new private school voucher program could cost $56 billion per year-more than all current federal K-12 spending combined.

"Congressional Democrats remain committed to delivering the resources our schools need to help every student succeed. Now is not the time to retreat from our responsibility to provide every child, regardless of background or zip code, with the opportunity to succeed."

Background: Nationally, 12th grade math and reading scores are down across most groups, with the lowest-performing students hit hardest. Alarmingly, 12th grade math scores are below 2005 levels, and reading scores are below 1992. Eighth grade science was not measurably different than in 2009.

In 2021, Congressional Democrats made the single largest investment in K-12 education in the American Rescue Plan Act. Although scores remained below pre-pandemic levels, preliminary studies showed that when states and districts spent their federal investments on academic interventions, student outcomes improved modestly.

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