No.
Multiple long-term educational indicators show clear increases since the federal Department of Education was created in 1979.
By 2020, the percent of adults 18-24 with a high school diploma or alternative credential had increased to 94.3 from 83.9 in 1980. The National Center for Education Statistics reported public high school graduation rates of 87% nationally and 81% in Oklahoma.
Scores on the NAEP long-term trend reading and mathematics assessments, typically administered to 9-, 13-, and 17-year-old students nationwide every four years, have also increased over the past five decades, except for the 10th and 25th percentile reading and 10th percentile mathematics scores for 13-year-olds, which decreased.
The average reading score for 13-year-olds is only one point above the 1971 score; however, reading and mathematics scores for 9- and 13-year-olds peaked well above their 1970s scores in 2012 before declining.
Oklahoma Watch partners with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims.
Sources
This <a target=”_blank” href=”https://oklahomawatch.org/2026/08/20/has-every-educational-statistic-gotten-worse-since-the-department-of-education-was-created/”>article</a> first appeared on <a target=”_blank” href=”https://oklahomawatch.org”>Oklahoma Watch</a> and is republished here under a <a target=”_blank” href=”https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/”>Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.<img src=”https://i0.wp.com/oklahomawatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/okwatch-icon.png?fit=150%2C150&ssl=1″ style=”width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;”>
<img id=”republication-tracker-tool-source” src=”https://oklahomawatch.org/?republication-pixel=true&post=761654&ga4=G-6G6K9FYSH8″ style=”width:1px;height:1px;”><script> PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: “https://oklahomawatch.org/2026/08/20/has-every-educational-statistic-gotten-worse-since-the-department-of-education-was-created/”, urlref: window.location.href }); } } </script> <script id=”parsely-cfg” src=”//cdn.parsely.com/keys/oklahomawatch.org/p.js”></script>
