Public commenter says U.S. high school proficiency has fallen, blames policies and unions

A commenter at the meeting, who identified themself as vice chair of the Education Workforce Committee, said recent national assessment results show 45% of 12th-graders are not proficient in math and 32% are not proficient in reading. The commenter called the results “a crisis” and said math scores are at their lowest level since February 2005 and reading scores are at their lowest level since 1992.

The commenter said the results come "despite America spending more per student than almost any other country," and attributed the declines to what they described as "student-last policies," unions, Democratic-backed school closures during the pandemic and "lowering standards instead of raising them." The speaker said their committee is holding hearings and calling witnesses to identify failures and propose solutions.

Direct quotes from the speaker included: "This is a crisis. It's a completely unacceptable." They also said, "As vice chair of [the] Education Workforce Committee, I can tell you that we're not ignoring this. We're holding hearings, calling witnesses, demanding answers." The speaker thanked President Trump and Secretary McMahon for what the speaker described as "charting a new course to return education to The States."

The remarks were delivered as public comment; the transcript does not show any motion, vote or formal directive resulting from the remarks. No data source beyond the speaker's references to "the nation's report card" and relative date comparisons (2005 and 1992) was provided in the transcript.