On the Code Switch podcast, 40 years ago, the Philadelphia Police Department carried out a bombing that destroyed a black neighborhood on live TV.

And yet the deadly events of that day have been largely forgotten.

There is now a historic marker because a group of middle school children were assigned to look at police brutality in their community.

Listen to the Code Switch podcast from the NPR Network.

Reading scores in the U.S. fell to a new low last year.

The 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress, known colloquially

as the nation's report card, showed that reading scores dropped an average of two progress points

for both fourth and eighth graders. That's below 2022's historic low. But two states are bucking this

trend, Mississippi and Louisiana.

In 2019, fourth graders in Louisiana ranked last in the country for reading, now at 16th.

It's also the only state to make a full recovery from pandemic declines.

That's according to Harvard and Stanford's Educational Recovery Scorecard.

Mississippi went from being the second worst-ranked state in fourth grade reading scores in 2013 to the 21st in 2022. How did two of the country's poorest states turn their literacy scores around?

And as reading scores fall nationwide, what can other states learn from them? I'm Jen White. You're

listening to the 1A podcast. We'll be back with our

panel in just a moment. Stay with us. On the Code Switch podcast, 40 years ago, the Philadelphia

Police Department carried out a bombing that destroyed a black neighborhood on live TV,

and yet the deadly events of that day have been largely forgotten.

There is now a historic marker because a group of middle school children were assigned to look at police brutality in their community.

Listen to the Code Switch podcast from the NPR Network.

Let's get into it.

Joining us in studio is education analyst Chad Alderman.

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