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Kentucky appears to be breaking its own education law.
The Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990 is meant to guarantee a stable, trustworthy assessment system for parents and lawmakers. Yet the state is now moving to dismantle the only reliable measure of high‑school performance it has ever had: the ACT. The alternative the education establishment has chosen does not meet Kentucky’s legal requirements.
For nearly two decades, every Kentucky junior has taken the ACT. It is the sole long‑term trend line the state possesses, the one measure that has remained consistent through four different state‑assessment regimes. It has revealed something uncomfortable but important: since 2016‑17, Kentucky’s ACT scores in reading, math and science have declined.
Over the past 33 years, Kentucky has struggled to maintain a dependable statewide testing program of its own. KIRIS, CATS and KPREP each came and went. The current Kentucky Summative Assessment (KSA) is only three years old and already shows signs of the same instability. Every time the system changes, Kentucky loses trend lines, transparency and the ability to measure progress over time. KERA was written to end exactly that kind of chaos—yet chaos is precisely what we have now.
Kentucky’s KSA reports rising proficiency in reading, math and science—the very subjects where the ACT shows worsening results. Two tests that are supposed to measure similar skills should not tell opposite stories. When they do, parents deserve to know why.
Instead of answering those questions, the Kentucky Department of Education has decided to scrap the ACT entirely and switch to the SAT beginning in 2026. This is not a harmless administrative choice. It destroys the only continuous source of college‑readiness data Kentucky has, eliminates the one metric that cannot be curved or inflated by the state, and violates both the structure and the requirements of state law.
Kentucky law is clear: the statewide college‑readiness exam must assess English, reading, mathematics and science. The SAT lacks a separate English section and includes no science component; it therefore does not satisfy KRS 158.6453. A statewide exam that fails to meet statutory requirements cannot lawfully serve as Kentucky’s college‑readiness test. Yet KDE is moving ahead despite the conflict with the law, the loss of accountability, and the apparent lack of any visible approval from the Kentucky Board of Education.
That last point matters. State statute places the Kentucky Board of Education in charge of the statewide assessment system. There is no record of a board vote to replace the ACT with the SAT, and it was KDE—not the board—that signed the SAT contract. If the shift was made administratively, it suggests a serious breakdown in how Kentucky’s education laws are being applied.
Parents already face an assessment system that cannot provide consistent or comparable data. Now they are being asked to accept the removal of the one tool that has held steady for nearly 20 years. Legislators should not allow that to happen.
The General Assembly has both the authority and the responsibility to intervene. Kentucky’s Supreme Court made clear in the Rose decision that the legislature is ultimately responsible for ensuring an efficient system of education.
Four immediate steps lawmakers should take:
- Restore the ACT as Kentucky’s statewide college‑readiness exam.
- Reaffirm in statute that the statewide exam must include separate assessments in English, reading, mathematics and science, exactly as KRS 158.6453 requires—thereby ruling out the SAT.
- Require an open, public vote by the Kentucky Board of Education on any statewide‑assessment contract, in keeping with KERA’s governance structure.
- Enact a stability provision that prevents KDE from constantly replacing statewide assessments before they can produce meaningful trend lines.
Kentucky’s families deserve an assessment system that tells the truth about learning, not one that resets itself every few years and discards inconvenient data. If legislators want to uphold KERA and restore public trust, they must act now—before the state’s last remaining thread of real accountability is permanently cut.
Richard G. Innes is an education policy analyst at the Bluegrass Institute.
