Only 22% of American high school seniors performed at the proficient level in math in 2024, and only 35% did so in reading, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the federal assessment known as the Nation’s Report Card.
Put the other way, roughly 78% of 12th graders are not proficient in math and 65% are not proficient in reading. Those students are now entering the workforce, the military, community colleges and trade programs.
This article looks at what the numbers show, what they do not show, and which career paths are open to graduates who leave high school without strong math and reading skills. It also examines a complication that is rarely discussed: many of the best-paying alternatives to a four-year degree screen applicants on the same skills, and put up other gates besides.
Background: The Class of 2024 Results
The 2024 results, released Sept. 9, 2025, were the first national look at 12th graders since 2019. About 19,300 students took the math test and 24,300 took the reading test between January and March 2024, Chalkbeat reported.
| Achievement level (12th grade, 2024) | Math | Reading |
| Below NAEP Basic | 45% | 32% |
| NAEP Basic | 33% | 33% |
| NAEP Proficient or above | 22% | 35% |
Source: National Assessment Governing Board and Washington Policy Center. The “Basic” row is derived by subtraction.
Average scores fell 3 points in both subjects compared with 2019. The math average was the lowest since 2005, and reading is down 10 points since 1992. A record share of seniors scored below Basic in both subjects.
The Class of 2024 was in eighth grade when schools closed in March 2020. But the Governing Board noted that the declines sit on top of a slide that began roughly a decade ago, so the pandemic is not the only explanation.
The gap is also widening. In math, students at the 90th percentile held steady while students at every lower percentile declined.
What “Not Proficient” Actually Means
NAEP sorts students into three levels: Basic, Proficient and Advanced. “Proficient” is a demanding benchmark, and it is higher than the grade-level standard most state tests use, Chalkbeat noted.
In simple terms: a student who is “not proficient” on NAEP may still pass a state exam and graduate. The 78% figure measures distance from a high bar, not the share of students who cannot do math.
The Below Basic figure is the more telling number. It describes students who lack even partial mastery of the fundamental skills expected at their grade. That is 45% of seniors in math and 32% in reading.
Two other cautions apply. NAEP tests 12th graders, not graduates, so some test-takers will not finish high school. And NAEP reports math and reading separately; there is no published figure for students below Proficient in both.
Where the Opportunities Are
The strongest options for graduates without a four-year degree are the skilled trades, energy technician roles and the military. Several pay above the national median wage of $49,500, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
| Career | Typical entry path | Median pay (2024) | Projected growth 2024–34 |
| Wind turbine service technician | Technical certificate, on-the-job training | $62,580 | 49.9% |
| Solar photovoltaic installer | On-the-job training or short certificate | $51,860 | 42.1% |
| Physical therapist assistant | Associate degree and state license | $65,510 | 22.0% |
| Electrician | Four- to five-year registered apprenticeship | $62,350 | 9% |
| HVAC technician | Postsecondary certificate or apprenticeship | $59,810 | 8% |
| Plumber, pipefitter, steamfitter | Four- to five-year registered apprenticeship | $62,970 | 4% |
Source: BLS Employment Projections. All occupations combined are projected to grow 3.1%.
The skilled trades. Demand is driven by retirements, infrastructure spending, data centers and electrification. The Associated General Contractors of America found in a 2025 survey that 92% of construction firms struggle to fill positions. Associated Builders and Contractors estimated the industry needed 439,000 new workers in 2025 and 499,000 in 2026.
Registered apprenticeships. Apprentices are paid from the first day, and employers or union locals typically cover training costs. The Labor Department says it has registered 345,000 new apprentices under the current administration, though Congress held apprenticeship funding flat at $285 million, Bloomberg Law reported.
Clean energy technicians. Wind turbine technicians and solar installers are the two fastest-growing occupations in the country by percentage. They start from small bases, though: wind technicians numbered about 13,600 in 2024, so 50% growth adds roughly 6,800 jobs nationally over a decade.
Healthcare support. Physical therapist assistants pay well but require an associate degree and licensing. Home health and personal care aides have far more openings, about 765,800 a year, but a median wage near $35,800, according to BLS projections compiled by Wagedex.
The military. Enlistment offers paid training, technical specialties and education benefits. It also has a qualifying exam, discussed below.
The Catch: The Alternatives Test the Same Skills
The common advice to “go into the trades” assumes those paths bypass academics. Many of the best-paying ones do not.
Electrical apprenticeships. Union electrical programs run by IBEW and NECA require an aptitude test with two sections: algebra and functions, and reading comprehension. Applicants answer 33 algebra questions in 46 minutes and 36 reading questions in 51 minutes, according to applicant guidance based on Electrical Training Alliance materials. IBEW Local 595 in Alameda County, California, requires a passed algebra course and states that pre-algebra and geometry do not satisfy the requirement.
The military. Every recruit takes the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB), which covers math and verbal skills. A 2010 Education Trust study of about 350,000 graduates found 23% did not reach the minimum score for any branch, the Associated Press reported. Separately, the Pentagon’s 2020 study found 77% of Americans ages 17 to 24 would not qualify without a waiver, mostly for health, weight and drug-use reasons.
The gate to a $60,000 trade career, in other words, is often an algebra and reading test. NAEP does not map one-to-one onto these exams, but they measure overlapping skills, and 45% of seniors scored below Basic in math.
There are on-ramps. Pre-apprenticeship programs can waive the algebra and diploma requirements at some IBEW locals, and recruits who complete military prep courses have raised their scores, according to Military.com reporting; participants in one program raised scores by an average of 18.5 points.
The critical-thinking gap
Underneath the math and reading scores is a third skill the trades rely on daily: working through an unfamiliar problem. Troubleshooting a dead circuit, reading a code requirement or diagnosing a failed heating system all call for it.
The entrance exams already probe it. The electrical aptitude test’s algebra section includes number sequences and pattern reasoning, according to applicant guidance, and the ASVAB includes an arithmetic reasoning subtest alongside computation.
NAEP does not report a separate reasoning score. The best federal measure is the Program for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC), which tested U.S. adults ages 16 to 65 on “adaptive problem solving” for the first time in 2023.
U.S. adults averaged 247 on that measure, below the international average of 251, and the United States tied for 15th among participating countries, the National Center for Education Statistics reported. About 32% of adults struggled with the skill, and average numeracy scores fell from 259 in 2017 to 247 in 2023, KHON2 reported from the same data.
The gap NAEP shows at the end of high school, then, does not close afterward. It shows up again in the working-age population.
Reasoning is generally built through math and reading rather than taught as a separate subject. That is why the skills gaps travel together, and why the pitch that the trades are safe from artificial intelligence, made by advocates such as Mike Rowe, rests on exactly the judgment those test scores measure.
The Second Catch: Rent, Licenses and Who You Know
Even a graduate who passes the entrance exam faces three more filters: the wage during training does not cover rent, the job requires a license earned under supervision, and the openings travel by word of mouth.
The wages do not cover the rent
A full-time worker needs $33.63 an hour to afford a modest two-bedroom rental and $28.17 for a one-bedroom without spending more than 30% of income, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition’s Out of Reach 2025 report. That is the “Housing Wage.”
| Occupation | Median hourly wage (2024) | Covers 1-bedroom ($28.17)? | Covers 2-bedroom ($33.63)? |
| Plumber, pipefitter | $30.27 | Yes | No |
| Wind turbine technician | $30.09 | Yes | No |
| Electrician | $29.98 | Yes | No |
| HVAC technician | $28.75 | Barely | No |
| Solar PV installer | $24.93 | No | No |
| Home health aide | $17.21 | No | No |
Hourly figures are the BLS annual medians divided by 2,080 hours. In simple terms: at the national median, not one of these careers covers a modest two-bedroom apartment on a single income.
The gap is wider during training. Electrical apprentices typically start at roughly 40% to 50% of the journeyman rate and climb toward full pay over four to five years, according to published apprenticeship wage scales.
On Long Island, the numbers are starker. NLIHC’s 2026 New York data puts the Nassau-Suffolk two-bedroom Housing Wage at $52.83 an hour, about $110,000 a year, and the statewide figure at $48.46.
There is an irony here too. The trades shortage is itself a housing problem: when construction jobs go unfilled, homes take longer to build and prices rise, ZipRecruiter’s Bachaud told 4 Corner Resources. The workers who could build more housing cannot afford to live near the work.
The license is earned under someone else’s supervision
About 21.6% of employed Americans hold a government-issued occupational license, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
A trade license is not a test a graduate can simply sign up for. Journeyman and master licenses generally require years of documented hours worked under a licensed supervisor. Before the state will trust a worker with a license, an employer or union has to trust that worker with a job.
That makes the first job the real gatekeeper. The aptitude test, the drug screen, the interview and the sponsor all come before the license.
The jobs travel by word of mouth
Just over half of trade workers, 51%, first heard about their field from friends and family, and only 16% found it online, according to a ZipRecruiter survey of 1,500 trade workers reported by 4 Corner Resources. Apprenticeship-trained workers in that survey earned a median of $91,000, compared with $65,000 for the self-taught, yet only 14% had completed an apprenticeship.
The pattern is measurable in federal data. Economist Matthew Staiger, using linked Census employer records, found that 29% of individuals work for a parent’s employer at least once by age 30, and that doing so raises starting earnings by about 19%.
Staiger also found that young people with higher-earning parents are more likely to land a job at a parent’s employer and gain more when they do. That kind of hiring is concentrated in blue-collar work and especially manufacturing, Harvard Magazine reported.
Union programs that require a new apprentice to have a sponsor can reproduce the same pattern, a Penn State human resources course notes, because the sponsors are drawn from the existing membership.
For a graduate with weak math and reading, no family in the trades and no savings to cover rent during a low-paid apprenticeship, the “no-degree” path has as many gates as the degree path. They are simply less visible.
Impact and Analysis
The proficiency data and the labor data point in opposite directions. Employers in the trades report historic shortages, while the pool of students ready for the screening tests is shrinking.
This matters for the “college isn’t for everyone” argument. That argument is sound on cost and outcomes, but it is often paired with an assumption that trade careers require less academic preparation. The entrance exams suggest otherwise: the trades are an alternative to a degree, not to algebra and reading.
The effects show up in several places:
· Employers absorb remedial costs through pre-apprenticeship programs, longer training timelines or unfilled positions.
· The military faces a narrower recruiting pool at a time when most young adults already fail to qualify on non-academic grounds.
· Students who are steered away from college without math and reading support may find the alternative doors closed as well.
The pipeline problem starts early. NAEP’s 2025 long-term trend results show that just 14% of 13-year-olds read for fun almost every day, down from 27% in 2012, according to the Nation’s Report Card.
There is also an accountability question. NAEP results drew sharp reactions from federal officials, but responsibility for curriculum, graduation standards and remediation sits mostly with states and districts, which set the bar for a diploma.
Conclusion
The jobs are there. Wind and solar technicians, electricians, plumbers and HVAC technicians all offer paths to middle-class wages without a bachelor’s degree, and employers say they cannot hire fast enough.
The obstacle is the same one NAEP measures. Apprenticeship and enlistment exams test algebra and reading, and most graduating seniors are not proficient in either. Behind the exam sit three quieter gates: training wages that do not cover rent, licenses earned only under someone else’s supervision, and hiring that still runs through family and friends. Closing the skills gap in K-12 classrooms is necessary, but it will not be enough unless the doors into these careers open to students who arrive without connections.
Key Takeaways
· 78% of 12th graders are not proficient in math and 65% are not proficient in reading (NAEP 2024).
· 45% scored below Basic in math and 32% below Basic in reading, both record highs.
· NAEP Proficient is a higher bar than most state grade-level standards.
· Wind turbine technicians (+49.9%) and solar installers (+42.1%) are the fastest-growing occupations and need no bachelor’s degree.
· Electricians, plumbers and HVAC technicians earn roughly $60,000 to $63,000 at the median.
· Union electrical apprenticeships and military enlistment both screen applicants on math and reading.
· U.S. adults scored 247 on PIAAC’s 2023 adaptive problem-solving measure, below the international average of 251.
· At the national median, none of the trade careers covers a modest two-bedroom rental ($33.63/hour); on Long Island the figure is $52.83.
· 51% of trade workers found their field through friends and family; 29% of Americans work for a parent’s employer by age 30.