Wyoming Students Rank Near Bottom in Post-Pandemic Math Recovery, National Study Finds
Why It Matters
Wyoming families and educators are confronting sobering findings from a new national academic assessment: the state’s students have lost measurable ground in both math and reading compared to pre-pandemic levels, even as Wyoming avoided some of the more severe school disruptions experienced elsewhere in the country.
The results carry weight for a state that recently overhauled its school funding formula and passed new literacy legislation — policy changes that supporters hope will reverse what researchers are calling a nationwide “learning recession.”
What Happened
A major academic scorecard produced through a collaboration between researchers at Harvard University and Stanford University ranked Wyoming 36th out of 38 states in math recovery and 20th out of 35 states in reading recovery, measuring student progress between 2022 and 2025.
The researchers converted state test scores for third through eighth graders into a common grade-level metric, using the National Assessment of Educational Progress as a benchmark to allow direct comparisons across states.
Wyoming students in 2025 performed the equivalent of 0.42 grade levels below their 2019 baseline in math and 0.41 grade levels below in reading — declines that place the state behind pre-pandemic norms despite remaining above the national average in both subjects.
By the Numbers
- Wyoming ranked 36th out of 38 states for math recovery from 2022 to 2025.
- Wyoming ranked 20th out of 35 states for reading recovery over the same period.
- Students are 0.42 grade levels below pre-pandemic math performance and 0.41 grade levels below in reading.
- Only five states plus Washington, D.C. showed meaningful reading score growth from 2022 to 2025.
- Nationally, students remain nearly half a grade level behind pre-pandemic reading scores.
State Officials Push Back — Partially
Wyoming Department of Education Chief of Staff Dicky Shanor acknowledged the national findings but pointed to different state-level measures that tell a more encouraging story. “Our state assessment scores reflect continued improvement post-COVID,” Shanor said, noting that in English language arts and science, proficiency has met or surpassed pre-pandemic benchmarks. In math, state assessments put Wyoming just 0.4% below pre-COVID levels.
Shanor also suggested Wyoming’s historically strong academic standing complicates recovery comparisons. “Our already high performance makes recovery comparisons at the national level more difficult for us,” he said.
Wyoming consistently ranks among the top three states in ACT scores among states that require all students to take the exam — a metric that paints a more positive picture of the state’s academic standing.
A National ‘Learning Recession’
The Wyoming data fits within a troubling national pattern. Harvard’s Tom Kane, one of the study’s lead researchers, noted that academic decline predates the pandemic. “The pandemic was the mudslide that followed seven years of erosion in student achievement,” Kane said, citing declining test-based accountability and rising screen time as contributing factors.
Researchers found that the country entered a “learning recession” as far back as 2013, with student progress in math and reading stalling well before COVID-19 arrived. Eighth-grade reading scores on national assessments are now at their lowest point since 1990, and fourth-grade scores have fallen to pre-2003 levels.
Since 2022, recovery has followed an uneven pattern, with the strongest gains in the highest- and lowest-income school districts. Middle-income districts have seen the least improvement on average.
Wyoming Districts: A Mixed Picture
Not all Wyoming school districts are struggling equally. Albany County School District 1 in Laramie is outperforming its peers in both math and reading recovery, according to the scorecard. Lincoln County, Natrona County, Sheridan County, and Teton County school districts also showed above-average performance in at least one category.
On the other end of the spectrum, districts including Converse County, Big Horn County, Sublette County, and Sweetwater County lag more than a full grade level behind in math recovery.
What’s Next
Wyoming lawmakers passed a significant school funding overhaul this spring alongside a K-12 literacy bill signed into law in March 2026, measures designed to boost reading outcomes and restructure how public education is financed. District administrators are now working through the implementation of those changes.
Updated NAEP scores for 2025 are expected to be released in June, which will provide the next major checkpoint for gauging whether Wyoming’s downward trend has stabilized or continued.
For more on Wyoming and regional news, see how foreign visitors are paying more to access Yellowstone and Grand Teton, and how the state is expanding access to overdose-reversal medication Narcan through a new online tool.
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