Since 1984, 75 percent of students who received the full series of Reading Recovery lessons reached grade level expectancy.

Success rate

Reading Recovery has a 75 percent success rate for children who complete a full series of lessons. Success means that formerly low-performing students:

• have demonstrated independent reading and writing strategies that will allow continued achievement
• can read within the average range of the class reading performance
• have made accelerated gains — not only increasing knowledge but doing so at an accelerated rate

Evaluation, accountability, and long-lasting success

Hallmarks of Reading Recovery in the United States are the established evaluation and accountability systems. Unparalleled in scale, participating schools have collected data on every single child served since 1984. Remarkably similar results have been reported year after year, with different children, different teachers, and different schools. The result is a consistent rate of success: 75 percent of first-grade students who experience a complete Reading Recovery intervention learn to read and write within the average performance range of their class.

Numerous research and evaluation studies demonstrate that Reading Recovery children continue to improve their literacy performance after the intervention has ended. There is strong evidence that the impact of Reading Recovery is long-lasting.