# CRLA Start vs End of SY 2025-26 in the Same Schools

In 6,061 schools in five regions, the CRLA share of Grade 1–3 learners at grade level rose from 15.6% at the start of SY 2025-26 to 51.3% at the end.

This is the Markdown copy of [CRLA Start vs End of SY 2025-26 in the Same Schools](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-start-vs-end-of-year-sy-2025-2026), an article on the NASH Reviewer Blog by Mark Anthony Llego, published Oct 27, 2026, updated Nov 4, 2026. Topics: DepEd data, Learning outcomes. NASH Reviewer is an independent practice platform not affiliated with DepEd, BHROD, or NEAP.

In the same 6,061 public schools in five regions, the share of Grade 1–3 learners reading at grade level on the Comprehensive Rapid Literacy Assessment (CRLA) rose from 15.6% in DepEd's earlier round of SY 2025-26 to 51.3% at the end of the year, counting each learner once. The share of struggling readers fell from 40.5% to 8.6%. Grade 1 Mother Tongue moved most, from 5.3% to 49.2% at grade level.

The CRLA is a teacher-administered reading screen that places each learner at one of five levels, from Low Emerging to At Grade Level; struggling readers are those at Low Emerging or High Emerging. The earlier round is DepEd's selected-school CRLA file, and the end of the year comes from the [EDCOM II early-childhood (ECCD) dashboard](https://edcom2.gov.ph/eccddashboard/) as of 10 May 2026. DepEd's file covers only five regions, so this is not a national result: every figure describes the 6,061 schools found in both files.

## Key findings

- DepEd does not say which round its selected-school CRLA file covers, but the evidence points to the start of the year: 89.5% of matched schools with Grade 1 Mother Tongue results had counts within ±15% of the dashboard's, the file's shares at grade level were lower in every block, and DepEd's download package dates the file 28 September 2025, before the mid-year assessment window.
- Counting each learner once, the share at grade level rose from 15.6% to 51.3% and the share of struggling readers fell from 40.5% to 8.6% (Cohen's h of 0.78 and -0.78).
- Grade 1 Mother Tongue moved most: the share at grade level rose from 5.3% to 49.2% and the struggling share fell from 72.9% to 12.6%, while Grade 3 English rose from 23.2% to 53.3% at grade level.
- The median school's share at grade level changed by +36 percentage points and the middle half by +23 to +51; 96.7% of schools improved and 2.1% declined.
- Comparing each school with itself, the odds of reading at grade level were higher at the end than at the start in every block, with odds ratios from 5.8 (95% interval 5.7 to 5.9) in Grade 3 English to 31.2 (95% interval 30.4 to 32.0) in Grade 1 Mother Tongue.
- Schools that started lowest appear to gain most (+42.1 points against +29.8 for the highest group), but measured from a start adjusted for school size the gains are +38.9 and +33.0: part of the catch-up is regression to the mean.
- Every division gained, by 26 to 55 percentage points, and the rank correlation between divisions' start and end shares is 0.50.

## Checking that DepEd's CRLA file is the start-of-year round

DepEd's selected-school CRLA file, analyzed on its own in [CRLA Results SY 2025-2026](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026), covers public schools in five regions, and DepEd does not say when the assessment was given. Three conditions test whether it is an earlier round of SY 2025-26:

- **Same learners.** Its Grade 1 Mother Tongue counts are within ±15% of the dashboard's for most of the matched schools. Two rounds in the same school and year should count roughly the same children.
- **Lower everywhere.** Its share at grade level is lower than the dashboard's in every one of the five blocks: Grade 1 Mother Tongue, Grade 2 Mother Tongue, Grade 2 Filipino, Grade 3 Filipino and Grade 3 English. An earlier round should show fewer readers, not more.
- **Timing.** Its documentation or DepEd's CRLA calendar is consistent with the start of the school year.

All three held. Among the 5,980 schools in both files with Grade 1 Mother Tongue results on the dashboard, 89.5% had counts within ±15% of the dashboard's, and DepEd's share at grade level was lower in all five blocks.

The third condition rests on the file's date. [DepEd](https://www.deped.gov.ph/)'s documentation names no round, but its download package dates the data file 28 September 2025. DepEd's CRLA calendar has a beginning-of-year assessment window in June to July 2025 and a mid-year window in November to December 2025, so the only round the file could hold is the first. Its Grade 1 profile, with most learners at Low Emerging, is typical of children who have just entered Grade 1. Its Grade 1 Mother Tongue count is also slightly larger, 197,476 against the dashboard's 191,363 (a difference of +3.2%), which fits a round taken before some learners moved or left.

So "start of year" rests on the file's date and the check, not on a label in DepEd's documentation. A file date records when the file was saved, not when learners were assessed, but a file saved in September 2025 cannot hold results from the mid-year window or from the end of the year.

## CRLA start vs end of SY 2025-26 by grade and language

In every block, the share at grade level rose and the share of struggling readers fell. Both files cover almost every Grade 1–3 learner in these schools, so pooled shares are population values and carry no sampling intervals.

![Stacked bars of CRLA reading levels for five grade-and-language blocks at the start and end of SY 2025-26 in the same 6,061 schools. At grade level rises from 5% to 49% in Grade 1 Mother Tongue, from 17% to 51% in Grade 2 Filipino and from 23% to 53% in Grade 3 English, while the Low Emerging share in Grade 1 falls from 55% to 8%.](https://nash.com.ph/blog/_astro/crla-start-vs-end-of-year-levels.BgUg_g_3_1JeuAk.webp)

*Figure 1. CRLA reading levels in each grade-and-language block at the start and at the end of the school year, in the same schools. Each bar covers all learners assessed in that block and round. Chart: © 2026 Mark Anthony Llego, NASH Reviewer. [Download the full-resolution chart (PNG)](https://nash.com.ph/blog/charts/deped-data/crla-start-vs-end-of-year-levels.png).*

The table gives the learners assessed and the share at each level, by block and round.

| Grade and language                     | Round         |   Learners | Low Emerging   | High Emerging   | Developing   | Transitioning   | At Grade Level   | Struggling (Low + High Emerging)   |
|:---------------------------------------|:--------------|-----------:|:---------------|:----------------|:-------------|:----------------|:-----------------|:-----------------------------------|
| Grade 1 Mother Tongue                  | Start of year |    197,476 | 55.1%          | 17.9%           | 10.1%        | 11.7%           | 5.3%             | 72.9%                              |
| Grade 1 Mother Tongue                  | End of year   |    191,363 | 7.9%           | 4.7%            | 11.7%        | 26.5%           | 49.2%            | 12.6%                              |
| Grade 2 Mother Tongue                  | Start of year |    218,841 | 26.8%          | 5.5%            | 15.0%        | 35.4%           | 17.2%            | 32.4%                              |
| Grade 2 Mother Tongue                  | End of year   |    196,223 | 4.6%           | 2.1%            | 9.4%         | 32.3%           | 51.6%            | 6.7%                               |
| Grade 2 Filipino                       | Start of year |    217,418 | 25.5%          | 5.2%            | 15.2%        | 36.9%           | 17.1%            | 30.8%                              |
| Grade 2 Filipino                       | End of year   |    196,905 | 4.4%           | 2.1%            | 9.2%         | 33.2%           | 51.2%            | 6.5%                               |
| Grade 3 Filipino                       | Start of year |    229,468 | 15.6%          | 3.2%            | 10.3%        | 48.2%           | 22.7%            | 18.8%                              |
| Grade 3 Filipino                       | End of year   |    214,961 | 3.3%           | 1.4%            | 6.2%         | 34.3%           | 54.7%            | 4.8%                               |
| Grade 3 English                        | Start of year |    224,986 | 13.4%          | 7.9%            | 13.4%        | 42.0%           | 23.2%            | 21.3%                              |
| Grade 3 English                        | End of year   |    219,074 | 4.6%           | 2.4%            | 7.9%         | 31.9%           | 53.3%            | 7.0%                               |
| All learners (G1 MT + G2 Fil + G3 Eng) | Start of year |    639,880 | 30.4%          | 10.1%           | 13.0%        | 30.9%           | 15.6%            | 40.5%                              |
| All learners (G1 MT + G2 Fil + G3 Eng) | End of year   |    607,342 | 5.6%           | 3.0%            | 9.5%         | 30.6%           | 51.3%            | 8.6%                               |

A percentage point is the plain difference between two shares. Cohen's h is a standard effect size for proportions that gives a move of a given number of points more weight near 0% or 100% than near the middle. By Cohen's usual guide, two-tenths is small, one-half medium and eight-tenths large.

Grade 1 Mother Tongue changed most. Its share at grade level rose from 5.3% to 49.2% (+43.9 points, h = 1.09), and its struggling share fell from 72.9% to 12.6% (-60.3 points, h = -1.32). Both are large changes.

In Grade 2 the two languages moved almost together. The share at grade level rose from 17.2% to 51.6% in the mother tongue (+34.4 points, h = 0.75) and from 17.1% to 51.2% in Filipino (+34.1 points, h = 0.74). The struggling share fell from 32.4% to 6.7% in the mother tongue (h = -0.69) and from 30.8% to 6.5% in Filipino (h = -0.66).

Grade 3 started highest and moved least, though its changes are still around medium in size. The share at grade level rose from 22.7% to 54.7% in Filipino (+32.0 points, h = 0.67) and from 23.2% to 53.3% in English (+30.0 points, h = 0.63). The struggling share fell from 18.8% to 4.8% in Filipino (h = -0.46) and from 21.3% to 7.0% in English (h = -0.43).

For all learners, counting each child once, the share at grade level rose from 15.6% to 51.3% (+35.7 points, h = 0.78) and the struggling share fell from 40.5% to 8.6% (-31.9 points, h = -0.78). By the end of the year each block had roughly half of its learners at grade level, so most of the gap between grades seen at the start had closed.

The next table gives the changes for each block; its last column is the within-school odds ratio explained below.

| Grade and language                     | At Grade Level, start → end   |   Change (points) |   Cohen's h | Struggling, start → end   |   Change (points)  |   Cohen's h  | Odds ratio, end vs start, within school (95% interval)   |
|:---------------------------------------|:------------------------------|------------------:|------------:|:--------------------------|-------------------:|-------------:|:---------------------------------------------------------|
| Grade 1 Mother Tongue                  | 5.3% → 49.2%                  |              43.9 |        1.09 | 72.9% → 12.6%             |              -60.3 |        -1.32 | 31.2 (30.4–32.0)                                         |
| Grade 2 Mother Tongue                  | 17.2% → 51.6%                 |              34.4 |        0.75 | 32.4% → 6.7%              |              -25.6 |        -0.69 | 8.3 (8.1–8.4)                                            |
| Grade 2 Filipino                       | 17.1% → 51.2%                 |              34.1 |        0.74 | 30.8% → 6.5%              |              -24.3 |        -0.66 | 8.2 (8.1–8.4)                                            |
| Grade 3 Filipino                       | 22.7% → 54.7%                 |              32   |        0.67 | 18.8% → 4.8%              |              -14.1 |        -0.46 | 6.5 (6.4–6.6)                                            |
| Grade 3 English                        | 23.2% → 53.3%                 |              30   |        0.63 | 21.3% → 7.0%              |              -14.4 |        -0.43 | 5.8 (5.7–5.9)                                            |
| All learners (G1 MT + G2 Fil + G3 Eng) | 15.6% → 51.3%                 |              35.7 |        0.78 | 40.5% → 8.6%              |              -31.9 |        -0.78 |                                                          |

## How much each school's CRLA results changed

Pooled shares can hide a wide spread. For each school, the share at grade level, counting each learner once, was computed in both rounds and the start subtracted from the end. The median change, which half the schools exceed, was +36 percentage points, and the middle half of schools changed by +23 to +51 points.

In all, 96.7% of schools improved (their share at grade level rose), 2.1% declined and the rest did not change. A decline is a data check, not a verdict: in a small school a few learners move the share a long way, and the two rounds come from different files.

![Histogram of the change in each school's share of learners at grade level from the start to the end of SY 2025-26, 6,061 schools. The median school gained 36 percentage points; the middle half gained between 23 and 51 points; 97% of schools improved and 2% declined.](https://nash.com.ph/blog/_astro/crla-school-change-start-to-end.p_RIttz1_171S2b.webp)

*Figure 2. Change in each school's share of learners at grade level from the start to the end of the school year, counting each learner once. The dashed line marks the median school. Chart: © 2026 Mark Anthony Llego, NASH Reviewer. [Download the full-resolution chart (PNG)](https://nash.com.ph/blog/charts/deped-data/crla-school-change-start-to-end.png).*

Part of this spread is chance, which also shapes which schools seem to catch up, as a later section shows.

## Comparing each school with itself: the within-school model

Pooled shares mix large and small schools, so a change could reflect which schools carry the most learners. A multilevel logistic model avoids that by giving every school its own starting level and its own change. For each block, it estimates how the odds of a learner reading at grade level at the end compare with the odds at the start in the same school. That comparison is an odds ratio, and an odds ratio of 1 means no change.

Every odds ratio is far above 1: 31.2 (95% interval 30.4 to 32.0) in Grade 1 Mother Tongue, 8.3 (95% interval 8.1 to 8.4) in Grade 2 Mother Tongue, 8.2 (95% interval 8.1 to 8.4) in Grade 2 Filipino, 6.5 (95% interval 6.4 to 6.6) in Grade 3 Filipino and 5.8 (95% interval 5.7 to 5.9) in Grade 3 English.

Odds ratios grow very large when a share starts near zero, so the Grade 1 figure is large partly for that reason; points and Cohen's h are better for comparing blocks. The odds ratio shows that the rise holds within schools, not only in pooled totals. Its intervals are narrow because each block holds many learners, and they are only as good as the model's fit.

The model also measures how much schools differ, on its log-odds scale. Schools' starting levels have a standard deviation of 1.11 and their changes a standard deviation of 1.15. Both are large on this scale and about the same size: schools differ about as much in how far they moved as in where they started.

The model was fitted by Bayesian sampling with 4,000 draws in four chains. R-hat compares the chains, and values near one mean they agree. The largest R-hat was 1.008, below 1.01. The smallest effective sample size was 465, above 400; it counts how many independent draws the chains are worth. Refitting with wider priors changed no odds ratio by more than 0.03%, so the priors have almost no influence on the odds ratios.

A posterior predictive check compares data simulated from the fitted model with the real files. The simulated pooled shares at grade level matched the observed ones in 10 of 10 block-and-round groups. Zeros are another matter. The share of school-blocks with no learner at grade level fell inside the simulated range in 0 of 10 groups, because the files hold more such zeros than the model produces (see Limits).

## Regression to the mean in CRLA school results

Schools that started lowest gained the most. With schools split into five equal groups by their start-of-year share at grade level, the lowest group (Q1) averaged 0.4% at the start and 42.4% at the end, an apparent gain of +42.1 points. The highest group (Q5) went from 35.1% to 64.9%, a gain of +29.8 points.

Part of that catch-up is regression to the mean. A school with few Grade 1–3 learners can report a very low start partly by chance, depending on which learners were assessed and on which day. Ranking schools by their start puts the unlucky ones at the bottom and the lucky ones at the top. In the next round the luck does not repeat, so the bottom seems to rise faster and the top more slowly, even if nothing else differs.

To size this, each school's start was adjusted for its size with an empirical Bayes estimate. It pulls each school's share toward the pooled start-of-year share: strongly for small schools, hardly at all for large ones. Here the pull is like adding 7.0 learners at the pooled share to every school. The lowest group's adjusted start rises to 3.5% and the highest group's falls to 32.0%. Measured from the adjusted start, the lowest group's change is +38.9 points and the highest group's +33.0.

The gap narrows but does not close: after the adjustment, the three lowest groups gained about the same, and the highest group still gained less. That may reflect real catch-up, more room to grow, or differences between the two files, and the data cannot tell these apart. The table gives all five groups.

| Start-of-year group   |   Schools | Start, as reported   | Start, adjusted for size   | End of year   |   Change, as reported (points) |   Change from the adjusted start (points) |
|:----------------------|----------:|:---------------------|:---------------------------|:--------------|-------------------------------:|------------------------------------------:|
| Q1                    |     1,213 | 0.4%                 | 3.5%                       | 42.4%         |                           42.1 |                                      38.9 |
| Q2                    |     1,212 | 5.7%                 | 6.8%                       | 45.5%         |                           39.8 |                                      38.7 |
| Q3                    |     1,212 | 11.8%                | 12.2%                      | 51.0%         |                           39.2 |                                      38.8 |
| Q4                    |     1,212 | 19.1%                | 18.7%                      | 56.4%         |                           37.3 |                                      37.7 |
| Q5                    |     1,212 | 35.1%                | 32.0%                      | 64.9%         |                           29.8 |                                      33   |

![Line chart of mean school share at grade level for five groups of schools ranked by their start-of-year share. The lowest group rises from 0% to 42% and the highest from 35% to 65%. Adjusting the start-of-year shares for school size moves the lowest group's start to 4% and the highest group's to 32%, so part of the gap between groups at the start is noise that disappears by the end.](https://nash.com.ph/blog/_astro/crla-regression-to-the-mean.DSp2TXzY_1730xs.webp)

*Figure 3. Average school share of learners at grade level for five groups of schools ranked by their start-of-year share: at the start as reported, at the start adjusted for school size, and at the end of the year. The adjustment narrows the gap between groups at the start. Chart: © 2026 Mark Anthony Llego, NASH Reviewer. [Download the full-resolution chart (PNG)](https://nash.com.ph/blog/charts/deped-data/crla-regression-to-the-mean.png).*

## CRLA change by region, language and division

These comparisons are about places and groups of schools, not individual children, and they count each learner once.

### By region

All five regions in DepEd's file gained by a wide margin. Region VIII (Eastern Visayas) started lowest, at 12.7% of learners at grade level, and gained most, ending at 53.3% (+40.6 points). CAR rose to 54.0% (+40.2 points). Region III (Central Luzon) started highest, at 18.3%, and rose to 52.1% (+33.9 points). Region IX (Zamboanga Peninsula) rose to 49.3% (+34.3 points) and Region I (Ilocos) to 46.9% (+32.7 points).

The struggling share ended between 5.8% in CAR and 10.0% in Region IX. The table shows both rounds for each region.

| Region      |   Schools |   Learners, end | At Grade Level, start → end   |   Change (points) | Struggling, start → end   |   Change (points)  |
|:------------|----------:|----------------:|:------------------------------|------------------:|:--------------------------|-------------------:|
| CAR         |       745 |          43,363 | 13.8% → 54.0%                 |              40.2 | 38.2% → 5.8%              |              -32.5 |
| Region VIII |     2,023 |         145,328 | 12.7% → 53.3%                 |              40.6 | 42.5% → 8.3%              |              -34.2 |
| Region III  |     1,362 |         241,417 | 18.3% → 52.1%                 |              33.9 | 38.9% → 8.7%              |              -30.2 |
| Region IX   |       805 |          67,998 | 15.0% → 49.3%                 |              34.3 | 41.7% → 10.0%             |              -31.7 |
| Region I    |     1,126 |         109,236 | 14.2% → 46.9%                 |              32.7 | 41.8% → 9.1%              |              -32.7 |

### By language of instruction

Grouped by the school's language of instruction, every group gained. At the end of the year, the share at grade level ran from Pangasinan (46.0%) to Sinugbuanong Binisaya (55.7%) among the 7 groups with enough schools to report. The language is the school's, not each learner's home language; [CRLA by Language](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-mother-tongue-filipino-english) looks at the language blocks in detail. The table shows each group's shares in both rounds.

| Language of instruction   |   Schools | At Grade Level, start → end   |   Change (points) | Struggling, start → end   |
|:--------------------------|----------:|:------------------------------|------------------:|:--------------------------|
| Sinugbuanong Binisaya     |     1,282 | 14.8% → 55.7%                 |              40.9 | 39.3% → 7.3%              |
| Kapampangan               |        75 | 18.1% → 55.0%                 |              36.9 | 36.1% → 6.8%              |
| Other                     |       207 | 12.4% → 54.9%                 |              42.5 | 36.1% → 5.2%              |
| Tagalog                   |     2,142 | 17.2% → 50.9%                 |              33.7 | 39.5% → 8.6%              |
| Ilocano                   |       828 | 13.6% → 49.4%                 |              35.8 | 41.2% → 8.2%              |
| Waray                     |     1,423 | 12.0% → 49.0%                 |              37   | 45.3% → 10.2%             |
| Pangasinan                |        90 | 13.6% → 46.0%                 |              32.4 | 42.6% → 10.0%             |

### By division

Every division in the file gained, by 26 to 55 percentage points. The largest gain was in Biliran (+55.4 points) and the smallest in Pagadian City (+26.0 points).

The Spearman rank correlation between divisions' start and end shares is 0.50. It compares orders: one means divisions finished in the order they started, and zero means no relation. A value of this size means divisions that started higher tended to end higher, but many changed places.

![Dot plot of the share of learners at grade level at the start and end of SY 2025-26 in 44 divisions in five regions. Every division rises; changes range from +26 to 55 percentage points. Ormoc City ends highest at 70% and Catbalogan City lowest at 39%.](https://nash.com.ph/blog/_astro/crla-division-start-vs-end.CF4vi0kE_Hzxvj.webp)

*Figure 4. Share of learners at grade level in each division at the start of the school year (gray) and at the end (colored by region), counting each learner once. Every division rises. Chart: © 2026 Mark Anthony Llego, NASH Reviewer. [Download the full-resolution chart (PNG)](https://nash.com.ph/blog/charts/deped-data/crla-division-start-vs-end.png).*

The table lists every division with its schools, both shares and the change.

| Division                   | Region      |   Schools | At Grade Level, start → end   |   Change (points) | Struggling, start → end   |
|:---------------------------|:------------|----------:|:------------------------------|------------------:|:--------------------------|
| Abra                       | CAR         |       170 | 13.8% → 49.9%                 |              36.1 | 43.8% → 9.6%              |
| Apayao                     | CAR         |        72 | 13.7% → 61.2%                 |              47.5 | 32.5% → 2.8%              |
| Aurora                     | Region III  |        77 | 14.3% → 57.9%                 |              43.6 | 37.1% → 7.0%              |
| Baguio City                | CAR         |        43 | 16.2% → 51.6%                 |              35.4 | 41.9% → 7.5%              |
| Bataan                     | Region III  |        71 | 12.4% → 48.5%                 |              36.1 | 40.3% → 5.6%              |
| Benguet                    | CAR         |       219 | 10.6% → 55.7%                 |              45.1 | 37.1% → 4.0%              |
| Biliran                    | Region VIII |        86 | 11.3% → 66.7%                 |              55.4 | 38.7% → 4.1%              |
| Borongan City              | Region VIII |        51 | 19.9% → 68.4%                 |              48.6 | 36.6% → 3.0%              |
| Bulacan                    | Region III  |       176 | 20.9% → 56.5%                 |              35.5 | 34.6% → 7.2%              |
| Calbayog City              | Region VIII |       157 | 8.6% → 42.1%                  |              33.5 | 46.7% → 9.3%              |
| Candon City                | Region I    |        28 | 11.4% → 55.9%                 |              44.5 | 43.5% → 2.3%              |
| Catbalogan City            | Region VIII |        50 | 9.7% → 39.3%                  |              29.7 | 50.9% → 18.8%             |
| City of San Jose Del Monte | Region III  |        35 | 15.4% → 44.0%                 |              28.6 | 38.7% → 8.2%              |
| Dagupan City               | Region I    |        34 | 14.3% → 54.7%                 |              40.4 | 43.4% → 9.0%              |
| Eastern Samar              | Region VIII |       189 | 13.5% → 55.1%                 |              41.5 | 39.7% → 5.0%              |
| Ifugao                     | CAR         |       171 | 12.5% → 52.6%                 |              40.1 | 34.9% → 3.6%              |
| Ilocos Norte               | Region I    |       112 | 8.8% → 46.1%                  |              37.3 | 51.0% → 9.5%              |
| Ilocos Sur                 | Region I    |       193 | 15.8% → 52.9%                 |              37   | 34.7% → 4.3%              |
| Kalinga                    | CAR         |        56 | 22.1% → 65.9%                 |              43.8 | 29.9% → 4.6%              |
| La Union                   | Region I    |       175 | 12.8% → 47.1%                 |              34.3 | 41.8% → 9.2%              |
| Laoag City                 | Region I    |        31 | 16.3% → 46.3%                 |              30   | 44.6% → 10.2%             |
| Leyte                      | Region VIII |       548 | 16.6% → 64.5%                 |              47.9 | 32.1% → 3.4%              |
| Mabalacat City             | Region III  |        40 | 17.8% → 46.1%                 |              28.3 | 48.7% → 13.6%             |
| Mt. Province               | CAR         |        14 | 16.2% → 63.0%                 |              46.8 | 22.8% → 3.8%              |
| Northern Samar             | Region VIII |       343 | 8.4% → 40.2%                  |              31.8 | 54.0% → 15.2%             |
| Nueva Ecija                | Region III  |       254 | 20.9% → 60.8%                 |              39.9 | 36.2% → 6.8%              |
| Ormoc City                 | Region VIII |        81 | 16.6% → 69.9%                 |              53.3 | 36.7% → 3.1%              |
| Pagadian City              | Region IX   |        62 | 16.0% → 41.9%                 |              26   | 42.1% → 14.1%             |
| Pampanga                   | Region III  |       209 | 18.0% → 53.0%                 |              35.1 | 35.7% → 7.4%              |
| Pangasinan I, Lingayen     | Region I    |       261 | 14.9% → 46.3%                 |              31.4 | 39.5% → 8.1%              |
| Pangasinan II, Binalonan   | Region I    |       186 | 16.7% → 43.9%                 |              27.2 | 41.3% → 12.1%             |
| Samar (Western Samar)      | Region VIII |       335 | 12.9% → 46.1%                 |              33.2 | 47.1% → 10.6%             |
| San Carlos City            | Region I    |        60 | 13.4% → 42.7%                 |              29.3 | 43.1% → 9.9%              |
| San Jose City              | Region III  |        50 | 16.0% → 50.3%                 |              34.3 | 45.1% → 6.8%              |
| Science City of Muñoz      | Region III  |        31 | 24.6% → 56.8%                 |              32.2 | 36.3% → 6.8%              |
| Southern Leyte             | Region VIII |       136 | 17.0% → 62.0%                 |              44.9 | 33.7% → 3.7%              |
| Tacloban City              | Region VIII |        47 | 7.7% → 39.8%                  |              32   | 50.0% → 13.5%             |
| Tarlac                     | Region III  |       220 | 21.6% → 53.5%                 |              32   | 37.1% → 10.0%             |
| Tarlac City                | Region III  |        86 | 16.3% → 42.9%                 |              26.6 | 47.9% → 16.7%             |
| Urdaneta City              | Region I    |        46 | 10.5% → 44.1%                 |              33.6 | 50.0% → 12.0%             |
| Zambales                   | Region III  |       113 | 13.2% → 46.4%                 |              33.1 | 47.5% → 9.8%              |
| Zamboanga Sibugay          | Region IX   |       163 | 16.3% → 62.2%                 |              45.8 | 39.7% → 4.6%              |
| Zamboanga del Norte        | Region IX   |       288 | 13.1% → 41.1%                 |              28   | 42.9% → 12.5%             |
| Zamboanga del Sur          | Region IX   |       292 | 15.6% → 53.5%                 |              37.9 | 41.6% → 8.7%              |

## What this means for school heads

A large share of Grade 1 learners are struggling readers at the start of the year: here, 72.9% of Grade 1 Mother Tongue learners were struggling at the start and 55.1% were at Low Emerging. That is expected. Many children enter Grade 1 still learning to decode, so a start-of-year CRLA is a baseline for planning, not a judgment on the school. What matters is how far learners move by the end of the year, and who is left behind. In a school's own two rounds, look for these:

- **Compare the same block across both rounds.** Set Grade 1 Mother Tongue at the start against Grade 1 Mother Tongue at the end, not against another grade or language.
- **Check the counts first.** If the number of learners assessed differs by much more than ±15% between rounds, the two rounds may not cover the same children.
- **Look below the top level.** A move from Low Emerging to Developing is real progress that the share at grade level does not show.
- **Read small numbers with care.** In a class of a dozen learners, one or two children move the share a long way, and a very low start partly reflects chance.
- **Compare with schools that started where yours did.** Low starters gain more on average, so a school that started near zero should be set beside other low starters, not beside the division average.
- **Track the learners still struggling at the end.** 12.6% of Grade 1 Mother Tongue learners and 7.0% in Grade 3 English were still struggling at the end of the year, and they carry that gap into the next grade.

[How to Read a School's CRLA Results Fairly](https://nash.com.ph/blog/how-to-read-school-crla-results) explains these checks in more detail.

## How these numbers were made

- **Sources.** The start of the year is DepEd's CRLA SY 2025-26 selected-school file. The end of the year is the CRLA results on the EDCOM II ECCD dashboard as of 10 May 2026, for public schools. Schools are matched by school ID, and only schools in both files are kept.
- **Blocks.** The five grade-and-language blocks that both files hold are compared (the dashboard has no Grade 3 Mother Tongue). "All learners" adds Grade 1 Mother Tongue, Grade 2 Filipino and Grade 3 English, so each learner is counted once.
- **Shares and effect sizes.** A pooled share is the learners at a level divided by the learners assessed. These are population values for the matched schools, so they carry no sampling intervals. Cohen's h compares the start and end shares.
- **School change.** The change for each school is its end-of-year share at grade level minus its start-of-year share, counting each learner once, for schools with learners in both rounds.
- **Model.** A binomial multilevel logistic model with a start level and a change for each block, plus a starting level and a change for each school. It was fitted with 4,000 draws, checked with R-hat and effective sample size, refitted with wider priors, and checked against simulated data.
- **Regression to the mean.** Schools are ranked into five equal groups by their reported start-of-year share. The size adjustment is an empirical Bayes estimate whose strength is estimated from the data.
- **Places.** Regions, divisions and languages come from the dashboard. Division orders are compared with a Spearman rank correlation.

## Limits

**Five regions, not national.** DepEd's file covers a selected set of schools in five regions, not a national sample, and only the 6,061 schools in both files are compared. The results cannot be read as national change.

**The round is not labeled.** DepEd does not say which round the file covers; the start-of-year label rests on the checks above, including the file's date, 28 September 2025.

**Different files, possibly different conditions.** Who gave the assessment, when within the window, and how results were recorded may differ between the two releases, and some of the change could reflect that rather than learning.

**Cohorts, not children.** Learners are not linked between the files, so a school's change is the change in its Grade 1–3 cohort, including learners who moved in or out during the year. It is not any one child's growth.

**Zero-heavy school-blocks.** Many school-blocks report no learner at grade level, especially at the start, and the model produces fewer such zeros than the files contain. Some zeros are real in small classes; others may come from how results were recorded. The model still reproduces the pooled shares, but its odds-ratio intervals may be narrower than they should be. [CRLA Schools With No Struggling Readers](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-schools-with-no-struggling-readers) checks the opposite pattern.

**No comparison group.** Every school had a year of teaching between the rounds, so the change cannot be credited to any particular program or practice. [Local Education Models in EDCOM II](https://nash.com.ph/blog/local-education-reform-models-edcom-ii) covers the reading programs the EDCOM II reports present as models, and the few results among them that come from an impact evaluation or a comparison group.

## Frequently asked questions

### How much did CRLA reading levels change during SY 2025-26?

In the 6,061 schools in DepEd's file, the share of Grade 1–3 learners at grade level rose from 15.6% at the start of the year to 51.3% at the end, counting each learner once. The share of struggling readers fell from 40.5% to 8.6%. These schools are in five regions, so this is not a national figure.

### Is DepEd's selected-school CRLA file the beginning-of-year assessment?

Very likely. In 89.5% of matched schools, Grade 1 Mother Tongue counts were within ±15% of the dashboard's, and the file's shares at grade level were lower in every block. DepEd does not say which round the file covers, but its download package dates the file 28 September 2025, before the mid-year window opened, and the file's Grade 1 profile fits the start of the year.

### Why are so many Grade 1 learners Low Emerging at the start of the year?

Many learners are only beginning to read when Grade 1 opens, so a high Low Emerging share in a start-of-year screen is expected. In these schools, 55.1% of Grade 1 Mother Tongue learners were Low Emerging at the start and 7.9% at the end. The end-of-year figure is the one to act on.

### Did any school's CRLA results go down during the year?

A small share did. Of the 6,061 schools, 2.1% had a lower share at grade level at the end than at the start, while 96.7% had a higher share. In a small school a few learners can move the share a long way, so a decline is a reason to check the counts before drawing conclusions.

## Download the data

The cleaned EDCOM II dashboard data behind this series are free to download for personal study; to reuse them, email [support@nash.com.ph](mailto:support@nash.com.ph) for written permission first. [How the EDCOM Dashboard Data Was Cleaned](https://nash.com.ph/blog/edcom-eccd-dashboard-data-cleaned) explains every table and cleaning rule. The files are at data.nash.com.ph: start with the [README](https://data.nash.com.ph/edcom-data/v1/README.md), then the [school table with CRLA results and school inputs](https://data.nash.com.ph/edcom-data/v1/edcom_crla_2026.parquet) (Parquet), the [school estimates](https://data.nash.com.ph/edcom-data/v1/school_estimates.csv.gz) (CSV), the [division estimates](https://data.nash.com.ph/edcom-data/v1/division_estimates.csv) (CSV) and the [municipal table](https://data.nash.com.ph/edcom-data/v1/municipalities.csv) (CSV). The DepEd school files used for school inputs are described in [Download Cleaned DepEd School Data](https://nash.com.ph/blog/download-cleaned-deped-school-data).

Every file, with its rows, columns and checksum, is listed on the [EDCOM II CRLA data page](https://nash.com.ph/edcom-data). To cite the data: Llego, M. A. (2026). *EDCOM II early-childhood dashboard data, cleaned, version 1*. NASH Reviewer. https://nash.com.ph/edcom-data



## More in this series

- [CRLA End-of-Year Results SY 2025-26: All 18 Regions](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-end-of-year-results-sy-2025-2026)
- [CRLA Start vs End of SY 2025-26 in the Same Schools](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-start-vs-end-of-year-sy-2025-2026)
- [CRLA by Language: Mother Tongue, Filipino and English](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-mother-tongue-filipino-english)
- [How to Read a School's CRLA Results Fairly](https://nash.com.ph/blog/how-to-read-school-crla-results)
- [CRLA Variation: School, Division or Region?](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-school-division-region-variation)
- [Where Struggling Readers Are Concentrated](https://nash.com.ph/blog/where-struggling-readers-are-concentrated)
- [School Resources and CRLA Reading Results](https://nash.com.ph/blog/school-resources-and-crla-reading)
- [CRLA Results in Schools With and Without a Principal](https://nash.com.ph/blog/schools-with-and-without-principal-crla)
- [Action Research and Thesis Topics on Reading (CRLA)](https://nash.com.ph/blog/action-research-topics-reading-crla)
- [CRLA Reading Hotspots: A Map of Struggling Readers](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-reading-hotspots-map)
- [Stunting, Day Care Centers and Early Reading](https://nash.com.ph/blog/stunting-day-care-and-reading)
- [Literacy and Nutrition Programs Compared With Need](https://nash.com.ph/blog/literacy-nutrition-programs-coverage)
- [CRLA Schools With No Struggling Readers: A Data Check](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-schools-with-no-struggling-readers)
- [How the EDCOM Dashboard Data Was Cleaned](https://nash.com.ph/blog/edcom-eccd-dashboard-data-cleaned)
- Regional reports: [NCR](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-ncr), [CAR](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-car), [Region I](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-1-ilocos), [Region II](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-2-cagayan-valley), [Region III](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-3-central-luzon), [Region IV-A](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-4a-calabarzon), [MIMAROPA](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-mimaropa), [Region V](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-5-bicol), [Region VI](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-6-western-visayas), [NIR](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-negros-island-region), [Region VII](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-7-central-visayas), [Region VIII](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-8-eastern-visayas), [Region IX](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-9-zamboanga-peninsula), [Region X](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-10-northern-mindanao), [Region XI](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-11-davao), [Region XII](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-12-soccsksargen), [Caraga](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-region-13-caraga), [BARMM](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026-barmm)
- Earlier reports: [CRLA Results SY 2025-2026 (DepEd's selected-school file)](https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-results-sy-2025-2026), [Do the Same DepEd Schools Lag on the ELLNA, NAT and CRLA?](https://nash.com.ph/blog/deped-schools-lag-ellna-nat-crla), [DepEd School Inputs vs Test Results](https://nash.com.ph/blog/deped-school-inputs-vs-test-results), [EDCOM II Final Report: Guide for Aspiring School Heads](https://nash.com.ph/blog/edcom-ii-final-report), [DepEd Data for Aspiring School Heads: Where to Start](https://nash.com.ph/blog/deped-data-aspiring-school-heads)

*Analysis and charts by Mark Anthony Llego for NASH Reviewer. Data: EDCOM II early-childhood dashboard and Department of Education public datasets. NASH Reviewer is not affiliated with EDCOM II or DepEd. Charts may be reused only with written permission from support@nash.com.ph.*

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© 2026 Mark Anthony Llego, NASH Reviewer. All rights reserved. You may quote up to 100 words from this article with the author's name, its title and a link. In research, cite it as: Llego, M. A. (2026, October 27). *CRLA Start vs End of SY 2025-26 in the Same Schools*. NASH Reviewer. https://nash.com.ph/blog/crla-start-vs-end-of-year-sy-2025-2026. Any other reuse of the article, its charts or its data needs written permission: email support@nash.com.ph. Terms of Service: https://nash.com.ph/terms#website-content-and-data