For the past fifteen years, a set of large urban districts have agreed to participate in the “Trial Urban District Assessment,” or TUDA, as part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Mike Petrilli and colleagues dug into the data and found that, from 2011 to 2015, four TUDA districts saw statistically significant improvements in reading in at least one grade level. D.C. and Miami saw improvements in both 4th and 8th grade; Chicago saw them in 4th grade, while Los Angeles saw them in 8th grade. None of the participating cities went backwards. New TUDA scores will come out with the rest of the NAEP results on April 10—and Chicago, D.C., and Miami are certainly districts to watch.

—Education Next