Welcome! 

 

My name is Chris Reykdal and I hope to earn your support as I seek re-election to the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI). It has been an honor to be your voice and leader overseeing our state’s K-12 public education system and advocating for the needs of our young people.

 

Following more than six years of closing student opportunity and achievement gaps, more equitable funding across our school districts, and an unprecedented health and safety response to COVID-19, public education both in our state and nationally is now being targeted by extremists who attack the diversity of our children, attack our highly trained and professional educators, and they cravenly promote lies to destabilize the confidence in public education in their attempt to drive taxpayer dollars to prop up their religious and for-profit schools.

 

I will not yield to those who attack our public schools for their personal gain. We have achieved so much, and our momentum is building. Student enrollments are rising, test scores are rising, graduation rates are near a record high, and we have given graduation pathways back to our students for them to pursue their passion in the trades, college, military service, or straight to work. Through hard work and coalition building, Washington State is becoming a national leader in bold innovations to ensure our K-12 system is prepared to meet the needs of our students and our global economy. 

 

Below are several key achievements since I was elected Superintendent. All of them took partnerships (especially the Legislature), and the real work of educators in our 295 local districts:

 

• Our graduation rates are at an all-time high, with the fastest gains coming from native youth, students with disabilities, and low-income students;

• We brought back civics as a graduation requirement;

• College remediation rates are at an all-time low in both the 2-year and 4-year institutions;

• Two-thirds of our high school students take at least one college course while in high school and a record number of our students are graduating high school with an Associates Degree;

• We’ve ensured free school meals to over 300,000 additional students (700,000+ total);

• We are at an all-time high in the percent of kids who are kindergarten-ready;

• We built regional mental health networks for students, and youth anxiety and suicide is declining in Washington state;

• We now have Career and Technical Education (CTE) graduation pathways and 52% of our graduates have taken two or more CTE courses (it was 38% when I took office);

• We have doubled the number of our students in acceleration programs;

• We are a top 15 state in the nation when it comes to the National Assessment of Education Progress;

• We are diversifying our educator workforce at the fastest pace in our state’s history and are introducing teacher residencies and teacher apprenticeships;

• We raised average educator salaries by 39%;

• We advanced a first-in-the-nation living wage for paraeducators to the Legislature (secured first $72 million in 2024);

• We secured $300 million on an annual basis for additional physical, social and emotional health staff statewide;

• We expanded healthcare to tens of thousands of school employees;

• We increased K-12 investments by over $5 billion per year or $4,500+ per student;

• A record high 50,000+ students are engaged in dual language learning as early as kindergarten, including tribal languages;

• We have increased funding to support students with disabilities to a record high (from $1.1 billion per year to $2.2 billion), and we have the highest number of students with disabilities learning in general education classrooms;

• We provided learning devices to more than 300,000 students in need;

• We delinked high-stakes testing from graduation;

• We developed a new school accountability system;

• We ensured that local timber revenue stays with local school districts; and

• We grew our school construction funds for small and rural districts to its highest level ever.

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