State legislators trying to defund Wyoming’s public education system often claim that our schools need to provide more “bang” for the state’s “buck,” given the high cost of running a school system in a rural state like ours.
But the actual results show that investing in Wyoming public education pays off: We have one of the best school systems in the nation, and should feel proud of the work done in each classroom across the state every day.
The latest evidence is the fact Wyoming’s ACT scores for the 2024 high school graduating class were among the best in the country.
The ACT is a standardized test to show colleges how prepared a student is for higher education.
Wyoming is among the 10 states in the nation that require every student to take the test. Of those states, Wyoming’s scores were Number One.
In other states, students who don’t plan to go to college often skip the ACT test. But in Wyoming, everyone takes it regardless of their career path.
Other states might boast higher overall scores for the select students who choose to take the test.
But Wyoming’s high scores show that our investment in a system that focuses on providing a quality education to all students, regardless of their background or future plans, pays off.
Wyoming’s exceptional ACT scores are just the latest in a long run of excellent outcomes compared to other states.
Wyoming students routinely have excellent grades on the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) tests, the annual “Nation’s Report Card.” It is considered the gold standard of tests and has been around since 1969.
Wyoming has been the “Best in the West” in many categories, including mathematics, where the state’s fourth-graders scored the highest in the U.S. in 2022. We ranked fifth overall in the nation.
Now, that’s bang for our bucks!
Unfortunately, many lawmakers in Wyoming seem intent on tearing our successful education system down.
On top of years of underfunding Wyoming schools, prompting a lawsuit, a recent push to use public money to pay for private school vouchers—aka “education savings accounts”—will take more resources away from rural and smaller schools, as well as special ed students.
The impact of these unfortunate policies might take years to materialize in the classroom. For now, we should celebrate and protect our current Wyoming education system.