One of Missouri’s top education priorities for 2026 is making sure every student is assessed for literacy.
Missouri Department of Secondary Elementary Education Deputy Commissioner Kelli Jones told Missourinet that state law requires teachers to use approved assessments, and over the past four years, the state has worked to train educators in the science of reading.
“We have trained thousands of teachers across the state on how to teach this, and we are just now getting to that point to where we can really have that expectation and implement all of this,” said Jones. “So, we expect next year 100% of our school districts to use a state approved assessment tool and then that following year after that we should have a really good look at what our literacy looks like in the state.”
Jones says about 90 percent of Missouri schools now use state-approved reading assessments, as districts phase out contracts with other vendors.
Like many professions, education faced a major teacher shortage after COVID. To tackle the problem, Missouri launched the nation’s first statewide educator job board. Jones told Missourinet that it’s changing how schools recruit and keep teachers.
“I think we launched it in January of 2025 and it really is just a platform where it’s a one-stop shop,” said Jones. “I think we had almost 22,500 users and I think nearly 1000 job seekers per week. So, we are getting a lot of attraction.”
Jones said the grant-funded job board will continue to help Missouri schools recruit teachers in 2026.
Missouri’s latest school report card shows encouraging progress.
The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education said public schools made positive strides in 2025, with more than 91% meeting or exceeding state standards.
Jones said even though this news is encouraging they know they still have room for improvement. “We’re really taking a good look at those 9%, those schools that scored below the 70 and with the annual performance reports and seeing what can we do to assist them into helping them get those scores at a higher level,” said Jones.
Jones also said more than 310 public schools improved their APR scores in 2025 when compared to 2024.
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