In this October 2025 data report(*1) of the Virginia Kindergarten Readiness Program (VKRP) to the General Assembly, we report on the fall, mid-year, and spring kindergarten data collected during the 2024–2025 academic year, kindergarten data trends from fall 2019 through spring 2025, and 2024–2025 prekindergarten fall, mid-year, and spring data for three- and four-year-old publicly-funded prekindergarten children. The report also provides an update on the mathematics, self-regulation, social skills, and mental health well-being assessment pilot in first through third grades (1-3 Assessment Pilot) and shares future goals of the VKRP system for the 2025–2026 year and beyond.

VKRP empowers Virginia’s families, teachers, and education leaders by providing a more comprehensive assessment system that shines a spotlight on pre-kindergarten and kindergarten students’ learning and growth. VKRP is a Virginia standards-aligned, multi-year early learning assessment system that produces actionable information to guide decisions at the student, classroom, school/program, and division levels from the beginning of pre-kindergarten through the end of kindergarten to support student learning. VKRP provides assessments of mathematics, self-regulation, and social skills to complement Virginia’s longstanding literacy screeners (Virginia Language & Literacy Screener: Kindergarten (VALLS: K) and Virginia Language & Literacy Screener: Pre-K (VALLS: Pre-K). Literacy data in this 2024-2025 report includes data from the VALLS: K, VALLS: Pre-K, and historical Phonological Awareness Literacy Screener-Kindergarten (PALS-K) data. Throughout the report, it will be specified where historical PALS-K data is included. Additional information on the literacy screeners can be found on the VLP website.

The 2024–2025 literacy data gathered from VALLS: Pre-K and VALLS: K come directly from Virginia Literacy Partnerships (VLP). This is the first year of statewide implementation of the VALLS: K. The new literacy screening system better reflects the component skills necessary for children to be successful in literacy over time and is more sensitive to literacy risk. As such, more children were classified as at high-risk for literacy difficulties at kindergarten entry as compared to previous years when the Phonological Awareness Literacy Screener (PALS-K) was implemented.

From 2014 through 2018, the Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning (CASTL) at the University of Virginia designed, piloted, and implemented VKRP in kindergarten through a voluntary rollout where, each year, an increasing number of school divisions elected to administer VKRP. Virginia began statewide mandatory kindergarten administration of VKRP in the 2019–2020 school year.
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(*1)This report is submitted to satisfy the requirement that "the Department shall submit such findings using data from the prior year's fall assessment to the Chairmen of House Appropriations and Senate Finance Committees no later than October 1 each year."