THE SENATE WILL take up its own version of a House-approved early literacy reform bill next week, increasing the likelihood that a new law could emerge in 2026 addressing the controversial question of how reading should be taught in schools.
The House passed its bill (H 4683) in October, advancing a sweeping effort to regulate early reading instruction amid what top lawmakers describe as a growing literacy crisis. A growing number of states have reshaped early literacy education around the “science of reading,” a research base emphasizing explicit, systematic phonics instruction.
Senate President Karen Spilka announced the Senate’s move Wednesday morning in a Substack post, saying the Senate Ways and Means Committee will release its version of the bill Thursday, with floor debate expected on Thursday, January 29. While she did not outline specific provisions, Spilka said the Senate bill will largely track the House’s approach in an effort to deliver a final bill to Gov. Maura Healey quickly.
“I can say that the Senate will join the House in backing evidence-based literacy learning programs that are proven to help our children,” Spilka wrote. “The House passed a comprehensive bill, and the Senate bill will echo many of their initiatives.”
A Senate companion bill to the House-approved legislation was redrafted by the Joint Committee on Education in December (S 2855) and given a favorable review to the Senate Ways and Means Committee. Sens. Sal DiDomenico, Robyn Kennedy, Jason Lewis and Pavel Payano voted favorably, while Sens. Patricia Jehlen and Patrick O’Connor reserved their right to vote.
The legislation comes as student reading performance in Massachusetts has slipped in recent years. While the state continues to rank among national leaders, MCAS data show that only about 42 percent of third-graders are meeting state expectations in English language arts, with significantly lower rates among students of color, low-income students, English language learners and students with disabilities. Lawmakers say the declines underscore the need for statewide intervention.
“If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a hundred times: education is Massachusetts’ lodestar,” Spilka wrote. “We have a lot to be proud of when it comes to education in our state. But we should make changes when students’ overall success is threatened.”
The House-approved bill would require school districts to adopt state-approved literacy curricula for kindergarten through third grade that address five research-based components of reading: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension.
It also mandates that K-3 students be screened at least twice a year using approved literacy tools, with targeted intervention and parental notification when students fall below benchmarks tied to age-appropriate development. The bill sets new standards for teacher preparation programs, requires regular evaluations of those programs by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE), and expands professional development requirements for educators.
A central — and controversial — feature of the bill is its restriction on certain instructional methods. Curricula that rely on “implicit or incidental” word-reading strategies, including visual memorization of whole words, guessing from context or pictures, such as the “three-cueing” approach, would be largely prohibited.
Supporters say those guardrails are necessary to align classroom practice with decades of cognitive science research on how children learn to read. Critics argue the language amounts to a ban on widely used “balanced literacy” approaches and intrudes on local control.
Sen. Sal DiDomenico filed the companion bill to the one the House advanced. The bills received their public hearing in September and drew hours of testimony from educators, parents, advocates and union leaders.
Massachusetts Teachers Association President Max Page warned that statewide curriculum requirements risk undermining teacher professionalism and flexibility.
“Having the Legislature dictate a particular curriculum and a particular mode is really dangerous and problematic,” Page told lawmakers. “[It] undermines the professionalism of our educators who are working with a diverse student body and trying to address their needs as best as possible.”
Page said no one is satisfied with current literacy outcomes, but argued the state should invest more heavily in reading specialists, class size reduction and instructional support rather than banning specific practices.
Supporters countered that decades of uneven results demonstrate that district-by-district discretion has failed many students.
“Only four in 10 Massachusetts students are reading at grade level,” said Mary Tamer, founder of MassPotential and a leader of the MassReads coalition backing the bill. “With far fewer in high-poverty districts, flexibility is not working.”
DiDomenico pressed union leaders at the hearing, saying the state has a responsibility to intervene when outcomes reach crisis levels.
“The data here shows clearly that what is happening today is not working,” he said. “We’re saying pick a curriculum that is evidence-based. The results are not there according to what we hope to see for our students.”
The state’s second-largest teachers union, AFT Massachusetts, did not outright oppose or support the bill.
AFT Massachusetts President Jessica Tang said it is “concerning” that the House-approved bill “establishes a limited, blanket curriculum… Even more concerning is that it bans important, proven tools our educators currently use and use successfully, particularly with our English language learners and students with special needs.”
However, Tang also lauded parts of the legislation such as reporting and tracking measures, expanded funding opportunities and a new commission focused on advancing literacy.
A 2024 MassINC poll found 84 percent of Massachusetts parents support requiring schools to use research-backed reading curricula.
In her “guest post” on MassSenate Substack titled “We Can’t Lead If Kids Can’t Read,” Spilka also tied the legislation to her own family’s experience. Her eldest son struggled to learn to read in elementary school, she wrote, prompting her family to step in with phonics-based support at home until his skills reached grade level.
She described swapping out a Bruce Springsteen album on their family turntable for a “Hooked on Phonics” record.
“As a parent, it was hard to see my son struggle with something as foundational as reading,” Spilka wrote. “As a legislator, I now know that our family was not alone — and that not every child has the resources and extra help that my son had.”
The News Service reported earlier in January that Mary Tamer, executive director of education reform nonprofit MassPotential, said the Senate would vote on the issue “very early in this first quarter.”
If the Senate passes a literacy bill, it would head back to the House for concurrence or compromise before landing on Gov. Healey’s desk. Healey has indicated early literacy reform is a priority for her administration and has backed significant investments in the area.
Around the same time Spilka’s newsletter went out Wednesday morning, the Healey administration announced the expansion of its free early literacy tutoring program to 84 additional elementary schools, bringing participation to more than 350 schools statewide.