Commentary The reading skills of Ontario students are showing marked improvement—at least according to the Ontario government. As evidence, government officials point to the fact that reading scores on the Grades 3 and 6 Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) assessments increased steadily between 2005 and 2019. This certainly looks like good news. But, like many government claims, it should be taken with a grain of salt. This is particularly true when we consider that other standardized assessments, such as the Programme for International Student Assessment, failed to show any significant increase over the same time period. It’s also important to note that nearly one in five Ontario students are now writing the EQAO assessments with “assistive technology.” This means that questions are being read orally to a significant number of students. Not only that, teachers or other volunteers are often writing down the answers for these students. In other …