Minnesota students’ reading and math scores on state proficiency tests aren’t dropping anymore, but they still haven’t recovered from a huge drop from the pandemic, newly released data from the state education department show.

As was the case last year, fewer than half of public school students met grade standards in reading, math and science, according to Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment results for 2024 released Thursday by the state Department of Education.

This year’s MCA results show that 45.5% of Minnesota students reached grade-level standards in math, the same as the year before. Reading scores also remained stable in 2024, with 49.9% of students testing as proficient.

Science, the lowest-scoring category at 39.6%, was up 0.4 percentage points from 2023. Last year it had dropped 2.1 percentage points.

In St. Paul, students’ overall scores had little change from those of last year. About 26% of students scored proficient in math, 34.1% were proficient in reading and 25.4% in science. The largest improvement from last year’s proficiency scores came in science at an increase of 1.4%.

Statewide, scores are down significantly since the beginning of the pandemic, which education officials say presented a challenge for students and teachers as schools closed and students shifted to remote or hybrid learning. Reading and math are both down 8.4 percentage points from 2019.

Scores had already been sliding before the pandemic. On the 2014 MCA, 63% of students grades three through eight were proficient in math and 59% were proficient in reading.

Education Department officials say they think a major state funding increase from the 2023 legislative session, which boosted state funding by more than $2 billion and tied the formula to inflation, as well as other measures like new reading instruction standards and teacher recruitment, will turn around flagging schools.

“We’re working hard to put these new measures into place, and I think it’s going to be the long term measures, many of which involve the large scale and systemic changes, that’s going to positively impact students for years to come,” said Education Commissioner Willie Jett. ”Schools all across the country have faced some unprecedented challenges the last few years, and I just believe we’ve made some progress.”

Jett said testing data is just one measure his department uses to measure school success. While scores have remained at lows reached during the pandemic, education officials said they were encouraged by the decline leveling out, as well as rising consistent attendance rates.

This year, statewide consistent attendance grew to 74.5% from 69.8% the year before. But the rate remains significantly below where it sat before the pandemic.

Consistent attendance means students attending at least 90% of the time. Before the pandemic in 2019, around 85.4% of students were consistently attending school statewide.

Achievement gap

Minnesota still has an achievement gap between students of different ethnicities, even as the state works to address the issue. In past years, white students were about twice as likely to be proficient in math and reading than Black, Hispanic and American Indian students. Results this year only changed slightly, according to the state education department.

Students take the reading and math tests in third through eighth grades and once in high school so state education officials can gauge the success of schools. Science testing happens in fifth and eighth grades and once in high school.

They’re also used as part of a federal education accountability system that’s required under the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act.

The test isn’t mandatory. This year nearly 93% of students took the math test and nearly 95% took the reading tests. And in 2020 the state did not have the MCA as the coronavirus pandemic shut down schools.

Other measures of school performance include academic progress, attendance and graduation rates in what’s called the “North Star Accountability System.” The state of Minnesota gives additional aid to schools that do poorly on those metrics.

Check back for updates on this developing story.

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In dire need of a win, the Twins instead got Chris Sale. And if the Atlanta Braves’ left-hander wasn’t exactly at his best, it was enough to keep Minnesota spinning.

Sale began Wednesday night’s game as the National League’s best starter and finished it in the exact same place, shutting down the Twins for six innings as the Braves finished a three-game sweep with a 5-1 victory in front of an announced crowd of 19,142 at Target Field.

The Twins have lost 8 of 10 games and fell to 3½ games behind first-place Cleveland in the American League Central Division race, 2½ behind second-place Kansas City and watched their lead over Boston for the third and final AL wild card spot shrink to three games.

Enjoying a career renaissance after four injury-riddled seasons limited him to fewer than 300 total innings from 2019-23, Sale (15-3) started the game with three perfect innings then danced in and out of trouble. He was charged with one earned run on six hits and a walk in six innings. He struck out six.

Twins rookie David Festa matched the veteran ace with the best outing of his young career. He allowed only two hits — including a first-inning home run to Jorge Soler that spotted Sale a 1-0 lead — and struck out seven.

Willi Castro drove in the Twins’ run, tying the game in the sixth with a two-out single through the left side that scored Ryan Jefferson from second. Sale then got Christian Vazquez swinging to end the inning.

After scoring their run, the Twins struck out six times over the final 3⅓ innings. They left the bases loaded in the fourth after Manny Margot and Ryan Jeffers put runners at second and third with no outs, and ran into an out in the sixth when Margot was thrown out at the plate by right fielder Soler.

Festa (2-4) walked only one batter, the last he faced — leadoff hitter Marcell Ozuna in the seventh inning. Manager Rocco Baldelli pulled the right-hander in favor of lefty Caleb Thielbar to face lefty Matt Olson, and Thielbar immediately surrendered a double to the gap in center that scored Ozuna from first to give the Braves a 2-1 lead.

Ramon Laureano followed with a single, scoring Olson from second, and moved to second on the throw from right-fielder Matt Wallner.

Thielbar fanned Michael Harris II for the first out, and Baldelli went to right-hander Jorge Alcala.

Alcala gave up an infield single to Orlando Arcia that sent Laureano to third, then gave up a swinging bunt to Sean Murphy. Alcala fielded it cleanly and threw home to catcher Vazquez, who tagged out a sliding Murphy for the second out.

But No. 9 hitter Luke Williams followed with a hard liner to left that glanced off the glove of Margot, racing back near the warning track, and scored Arcia and Murphy to make it 5-1.

The Twins begin a three-game home series against Toronto on Friday.

Briefly

Michael Tonkin, claimed off waivers from the New York Yankees on Tuesday, pitched a scoreless eighth inning. The veteran right-hander gave up singles to Ozuna and Laureano but struck out three.

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The St. Thomas Tommies begin their fourth season of Division I football on Thursday night at O’Shaughnessy Stadium in a matchup with Division II University of Sioux Falls.

The Tommies are expected to contend for the Pioneer Football League title, and, as usual, any talk of team strengths begins with the offensive line. But head coach Glenn Caruso believes his defensive line is playing as well as any he has had as he enters his 17th season leading the Tommies.

“We’re still going to have to see if the game reps display that,” Caruso said. “Last year we played very well; we weren’t very deep. The difference this year is that we’re tremendously deep. We’re only a three-man front, but we have seven guys who can play winning football for us.”

Graduate student C.J. Warren (6-foot-3, 275 pounds), graduate student Seth Hopkins (6-0, 271) and senior Noah Friedt (6-1, 280) are the starters, with Hopkins manning the nose tackle position.

“Emmanuel Olagbaju (6-2, 301) is playing like a legitimate starter (on the nose),” Caruso said. “It just so happens there’s another guy at the position.”

Evan Tyler (6-4, 252) and Kole Sneed (6-2, 246), who has been converted from outside linebacker, also are expected to see considerable playing time.

“There’s very little, if any, falloff when we put the other guys in,” Caruso said.

Defensive linemen in a 3-4 defense typically are not asked to make a lot of tackles. Instead, they often take on double-teams, freeing up linebackers and defensive backs to make the tackle. The fact that the group features technically sound, disciplined players, Caruso said, allows them to be difference-makers.

“They can move and they play with great base,” Caruso said. “They not only can accelerate, but they can decelerate really well, and that’s a quality a lot of people don’t pay attention to.

“I can make a strong case that a technically sound disruptor on the defensive line is more valuable than a defense lineman that has stats. Our track record proves that.”

The group, as a whole, is not blessed with great size, and there will be times this season when they will going up against offensive linemen who outweigh them by as much as 50 pounds or more. Caruso does not see that as an issue.

“Inherently, defensive linemen are not as big as offensive linemen in this scheme,” he said, “but they’re asked to do more athletic movements. Our guys are getting bigger. The weights may be similar, but the length is not.

“I’m happy that as transition from the old division to Division I that we have been able to retain those core beliefs and qualities, but we’ve gotten longer.”

And if things play out the way Caruso hopes they will, better. The answer to just how good this group can be begins to take shape Thursday night.

“A lot of things have to happen for you to say you have the best of anything,” Caruso said. “If I’m going to say this has the chance to be the best defensive line in our 17 years at St. Thomas, yes, it has to have to do with experience, but it also has to do with depth, it also has to do with coaching.

“It also has to do with each person getting a little bit better. If each person can get a little bit better than they were last year, that’s how culture raises the level of talent in your program.”

As for the offensive line, it will feature a pair of new starters at guard in James Morrison (6-6, 341), a junior from Cretin-Derham Hall, and sophomore Marcus Johnson (6-6, 311). Last year’s starters, seniors Shea Albrecht and Brock Stanek, are slated to see playing time at both guard and tackle.

Morrison and Johnson join tackles Jason Laliberte (6-8, 301) and Alec Rasmussen (6-7, 319) and center Langston Robinson (6-2, 301) as part of the Tommies’ massive offensive line.

With the offensive and defensive lines leading the way, Caruso likes the vibe of this team as the season unfolds.

“Last year was so patchy,” he said. “There were games we had to win 35-32, and then there were games you had to win 20-13 or 16-10. Last year what I did not see was the offense and the defense jibing and playing off one another.

“It doesn’t mean we weren’t able to find ways to win games, but we weren’t playing complementary football. This team seems to be a little more together. They seem to appreciate what the other side of the ball does a little bit better.”