By Jennifer Pignolet, MediaNews Group
After a few easy prompts to get them started, Michele Malesyzk warns her daughter: This next one’s going to be tough.
“ANG,” says Maleszyk, emphasizing the three sounds in the one blended sound found in words like “pang” or “angry.”
Sitting atop a barstool at their kitchen countertop, 8-year-old Grace Zinczuk sticks her left index finger into a tray of sand in front of her and traces out the letters that make the sound. “A-N-G,” she writes.
Having properly matched the letters to the sound, Grace gives the tray a shake, and the black and green grains of sand fall flat again, ready for her next set of letters.
Grace, a third grader, practices these lessons with her mother most days after school in addition to her usual homework in a bid to fill a hole in Grace’s foundational literacy skills. Grace has dyslexia, a learning disability that makes reading and writing difficult, especially without explicit, direct instruction on the mechanics of reading. The hole in Grace’s literary skills exists, Malesyzk said, because of the reading curriculum used by Troy Public Schools, where Grace attended kindergarten through second grade.
Troy’s curriculum has received years of criticism, locally, across the state and the country, for its gaps in how it teaches students — especially ones with dyslexia — to learn to read. The Troy district defended its approach by noting its third graders have high reading scores on the Michigan Student Test of Educational Progress, with 67.9% proficiency compared with the state’s overall third grade English language arts proficiency of 38.9%.
But districts with the same or similar programs across Michigan are soon going to be forced to adopt new ways — at least in part.
The state of Michigan last year approved two new literacy laws aimed at districts like Troy that have been using programs that are not aligned with what’s known as the “science of reading.” Many districts across Michigan have already moved in that direction, focusing on equipping students with skills to “decode” words they don’t know.
School districts will have to screen children for signs of dyslexia, address lagging students’ needs with intervention methods approved by the state, and involve parents in the process of catching up students who are behind. They will also have to provide training to teachers in the science of reading.
The literacy laws’ supporters said the new requirements are a significant step toward moving Michigan’s stubbornly low literacy rates, while still balancing the state’s tradition of local control, especially in schools. But some are worried the law doesn’t go far enough.
‘I would have tried to guess the word’
While her parents have read to her regularly since she was a baby, Grace struggled to learn to read. She particularly didn’t love chapter books.
“Sometimes I didn’t really read a page,” Grace said. If she got stuck on a word she couldn’t figure out? “I would have tried to guess the word.”
Maleszyk grew up in Troy and attended Troy schools. When her family moved back to the area, she said, they chose Troy for the community and the schools.
Maleszyk, a former teacher in older elementary school grades, said she didn’t research the school’s reading curriculum when deciding where to move. She wishes she had.
Troy uses a reading curriculum called Units of Study, authored by Lucy Calkins, from the Teacher’s College at Columbia University. In the past few years, Columbia has distanced itself from the program, dissolving its professional development support efforts for the curriculum. The program, once beloved for its literature-rich materials and goal of building a love of reading in young children, has faced intense scrutiny for its gaps in explicit instruction, especially around phonics.
Some of the curriculum has been updated to include a stronger phonics piece, but multiple states with mandates to use the science of reading have not approved Calkins’ program for use, including Ohio and Tennessee.
The Troy district said in an email that it will comply with all Michigan laws, but did not commit to moving away from Calkins’ program. The district touted its high overall reading rates in third grade and noted that a review of the English language arts curriculum will begin next year.
“As part of this process, we will evaluate a variety of evidence-based resources,” director of Communications and Strategic Initiatives Kendra Montante said. “While committed to continuous improvement, the district’s literacy program is comprehensive with instruction and intervention systems fully aligned to Michigan standards.”
In June, the school board approved the purchase of Calkins’ Units of Study writing program.
Two board members dissented, saying they were aware of the criticism of Units of Study. Board member Stephanie Zendler said then the district “must begin to align all literacy instruction with the science of reading.”
“Recent revisions to the program have attempted to incorporate some of these things, but these changes still fall short of what is required for a comprehensive, research-aligned literacy framework that works for all of our students, in particular, our most at-risk learners,” Zendler said. “Adopting a curriculum that does not fully reflect this work would be a step backward at a time when we need to accelerate learning recovery and close achievement gaps.”
Last year’s test scores showed a significant achievement gap between students who are economically disadvantaged and those with disabilities. The district also had a significant racial disparity in third-grade reading proficiency. About 38% of Black students tested proficient, compared with 70% of White students and 73% of Asian students. White and Asian students make up 83% of the school’s third graders.
Board member Vital Anne, who voted for the adoption, said at the meeting she heard the concerns and was aware of the upcoming literacy laws, but that she was comfortable with the curriculum updates and that they had support from Troy’s teachers.
“No curriculum ever is perfect or complete,” Anne said.
Maleszyk said she could see the curriculum was not working for Grace.
“She would sometimes cry in the morning, not want to go to school,” Maleszyk said.
After spending over $10,000 on tutoring, buying materials to help tutor her at home and hiring an advocate to push for additional services through the Troy schools, she pulled Grace out of the district this fall. Three months in at her private Catholic school, Grace is receiving three 30-minute sessions a week to rebuild the foundational skills she missed, Maleszyk said. She loves chapter books now, especially ones about ponies and magic.
“I’m thinking like, wow, this is so much better,” Grace said.
Maleszyk said she worries that districts like Troy will continue to do a “workaround” of the law. She reached out to the Michigan Department of Education to ask how its officials would enforce the law.
“They told me that they’re going to rely on parents like me,” she said.
DeNesha Rawls-Smith, literacy unit manager at the Michigan Department of Education, emphasized that the new literacy laws are just that — laws.
“If you have a child that is not performing, then they are entitled to intervention, no matter how well your school is doing,” Rawls-Smith said. “So I would encourage them to sit down with parents and make the changes needed for that child, because that’s what the law requires. If I can’t appeal to your humanity, I’m going to appeal to what the law says.”
Even successful districts, she said, are “only as successful as your most challenging student, or your student that is having the most challenges, or your teacher that is having the most challenges.”
“I think if one child is not reading, that’s a cause for us to pause and look at what we’re doing,” Rawls-Smith said. “And we don’t have any districts … that have 100% proficiency.”
Michigan avoids full mandates
About a decade ago, when state Sen. Jeff Irwin, D-Ann Arbor, was a member of the state House, a mother told him about having to fight her son’s public school to get him the help he needed after being diagnosed with dyslexia.
“Her message to me was, ‘You know, not every kid’s gonna have the resources and the parent with the time and the ability to fight this fight,’” Irwin said. “‘And this is wrong. And you know, do you know anything about the science of reading, and do you know anything about dyslexia? Maybe you should.’”
The science of reading includes five main components: phonemic awareness (sounds), phonics (the connection between letters and sounds), fluency (reading text accurately), vocabulary (knowing the meaning of words), and comprehension (understanding what’s been read). It teaches students skills to figure out words they don’t know by attacking the word directly, sounding it out or using their fingers to tap out the sounds as they say them.
Previous methods of teaching, known as “whole language” or “balanced literacy,” have focused less on the explicit teaching of reading, and more on the exposure to books, and encouraging other ways of figuring out words, like looking at the pictures or other words around the one a student doesn’t know. Critics have said balanced literacy often leads more to memorization than actual reading.
Irwin and a group of literacy advocates tried over a period of years to pass legislation that would require schools to do more not just for students with dyslexia, but also those who may just need more support to learn to read.
“We tried to make this a bill that would promote literacy broadly, not just a bill that was focused on how to help kids who have characteristics of dyslexia,” he said.
In October 2024, the Michigan Legislature passed two new literacy laws, aimed at spurring growth just as new test scores showed the state ranking 44th in the nation in fourth grade reading. The laws updated what was formerly known as the Read by Grade Three Law.
The first law, Public Act 146, requires the Michigan Department of Education to create a list of high-quality instructional materials aligned with the science of reading. It also requires school districts to screen students three times a year for signs of dyslexia or any struggle to read. Districts must use a state-approved program to do the screening and support the student through intervention. Both must align with the science of reading.
The law also requires training for all teachers that hits on seven aspects of teaching reading, although no specific program or a set number of hours was required. Districts must also notify parents if a student is showing signs of struggling to read, including challenges with spelling or letter and sound recognition. The majority of the law does not take effect until fall 2027.
The second law, Public Act 147, addresses teacher training programs, requiring that future teachers receive training in the science of reading.
In the last three years, 26 states have passed laws around the science of reading, according to APM Reports. They have used a series of tools to help either strongly encourage or require districts to move away from balanced literacy programs.
Some states have opted for more stick than carrot, legislating a mandate that districts must use a curriculum vetted by their departments of education and rooted in the science of reading.
Michigan steered away from such mandates — more carrot, less stick. The state offered funding for new programs, and to use the funding, districts had to adopt from an approved list. But there is no law fully stopping districts from using a balanced literacy program, even alongside, for example, an early literacy phonics program.
Troy received state grant money to adopt UFLI, a phonics program for students in grades K-2.
rwin said Michigan could have tried to go the way of a full curriculum mandate, but a commitment to being a local-control state made that untenable.
“We need to win this battle on literacy through changing culture, through demonstrating that the right methods work,” Irwin said. “And I think that’s always going to be more important than the statutory hammer.”
But even those who strongly support the new law are worried it won’t be enough.
“It’s a problem,” Ann Arbor Public Schools board member Susan Wald-Schmidt said. “There are no teeth in this bill to say they have to do it.”
Wald-Schmidt, who worked closely with Irwin and others on the bill, said she heard from a teacher in another state — one that does have a mandate — that their district still was finding ways around the law. Even in states with “mandates,” she said, if there isn’t a penalty, there will be those unmotivated to change.
LETRS training eye-opening
David Pelc, a Romulus School District reading interventionist, created a network to support teachers. Pelc is the founder and administrator of a Facebook group called “Michigan’s Science of Reading-What I Should Have Learned in College.” It has over 4,300 members.
Teachers, parents and administrators across the state post questions, resources, strategies and trainings, providing the support that, in some cases, districts have not provided.
Pelc said before the COVID pandemic, he knew the reading strategies, especially for struggling readers, weren’t working. He looked for a new way and found people online talking about the science of reading.
“People were kind of grabbing little parts and pieces,” he said.
Once he saw the difference it made in his own students, he wanted to help pull all those pieces together and help teachers learn the baseline knowledge they need to know to teach reading.
“I’m always looking at like, ‘Why don’t they know this?’ you know?” Pelc said. “But then I’m like, I didn’t know that. How did I find out? And it’s a lot of just kind of discovering, which takes a long time, and wastes a lot of time.”
Pelc said he was encouraged to see the new literacy laws. But without proper training, not just on the science of reading but any new curriculum a district adopts, it won’t be successful, he said.
Pelc said as more districts begin to support teachers through the transition, more are looking to go deeper still. Michigan is recommending, but not requiring, all teachers who work with young students or who teach English at any age to take an intensive, 60-hour course called LETRS as a way to meet the state training requirement.
Some districts, like Detroit Public Schools Community District, have found ways to incentivize teachers to take it, paying them a $5,000 bonus. (“Don’t tell me that,” Pelc said, noting he took the training for free.)
Pelc said it was eye-opening, but he knows of some teachers who started the training and dropped out because it was difficult and time-consuming.
“I really don’t know what the answer is,” he said. “I feel like there’s got to be a way to teach this in an easier, more structured way, like to roll it out so everyone is sold on it and believes in it, you know?”
Jeff Cobb, director of government affairs for EdTrust Midwest, said the training for teachers is the key to the science of reading reaching all students, even without a mandate.
“Understand that science of reading is based in science, and it’s actually evidenced, proven, and it’s not just opinion,” Cobb said. “It’s curriculum, and it’s interventions that are that are based on things that work.”
The science of reading has been credited with what’s known in education circles as the “Southern surge,” as traditionally red states such as Arkansas, Tennessee, Georgia and Mississippi — which has its own “Mississippi Miracle” slogan — find success in turning around stubbornly low reading rates. Cobb noted that in Michigan, efforts to pass the legislation were bipartisan.
“It seemed to bring people from both sides of the aisle together,” Cobb said. “And let’s face it, that’s very unusual in this political climate.”
One former Troy parent moved her family to the South, in part because of the literacy laws.
Tracy Owens said she fought for her son, who had dyslexia, to receive more services at his school in Troy. She, too, initially moved to Troy for the schools, believing they were the best.
“I realized a lot of kids were getting tutoring, and I was like, you know, we can’t afford a couple thousand dollars a month to send our kids in for tutoring,” Owens said.
When they moved to Georgia, testing showed that her daughter, a third grader who had gone to school in Troy up to that point, was reading at a level between kindergarten and first grade. Owens said she sent the results to the Troy school board.
“It’s hard for me because I’m like — I knew something was wrong,” Owens said. “… I maybe would have caught it when it was earlier, if I would have pushed a little harder.”
