USBE highlights gains in teacher-prep reading scores and warns metric change will raise reported rates

Utah State Board of Education staff on Wednesday told committee members that university pass rates for the Utah Foundations of Reading Assessment (UFRA) have climbed substantially and that the agency is preparing LEAs for a metric change under SB241 that will affect how the state reports reading-on-grade-level.

Julie Clark, P–12 English language arts coordinator, said the average UFRA passing rate for teacher candidates reached about 90% in the most recent year, with an average score increase from roughly 242 to 257 on the assessment; the UFRA passing threshold was described as 240. Staff also described a review-and-support system for educator-preparation programs: any program with under a 75% pass rate enters a system of support coordinated by a designated science-of-reading specialist.

Clark warned that SB241 redefines reading-on-grade-level to include both 'at' and 'above' benchmark scores on Acadience (a universal screening assessment), and the board’s implementation of a single cut score will cause the state’s reported percentage of students reading on grade level to increase — for example, earlier public reporting that cited roughly 50% reading-on-grade-level is expected to read about 70% under the new definition. Clark said staff will update guidance documents, reporting platforms and the school report card to reflect the metric change and emphasized careful public messaging.

"So we'll need to make sure that as we message that out, we are messaging that we changed how we are measuring our students so that we're reporting correct information to them," Clark said. She described supports provided for LEAs, including regional literacy nights and caregiver engagement sessions, and noted plans to update teacher guidance and report-card displays.

Board members asked for additional breakdowns (including English-language-learner data and district-level detail) and noted that the law’s goals are intended to focus resources on students who need tier 2 and tier 3 interventions. Staff said they would provide additional disaggregated data and further guidance to literacy leaders in districts.

Next step: USBE staff will update guidance documents and school-reporting platforms and share disaggregated data for LEAs.