Student literacy assessments contribute to identifying the U.S. Agency for International Development’s (USAID’s) progress toward Goal 1: improving reading skills for 100 million children by 2015. Tracking progress toward this goal is challenging, and information regarding literacy assessments across sub-Saharan Africa has yet to be fully coordinated. Accordingly, the purpose of this study is to advance knowledge of which select countries in sub-Saharan Africa have and have not conducted early grade reading assessments, while also providing information regarding where literacy issues remain critical and where improvement is underway. Twenty countries were selected because of USAID’s presence and continued interest in working to improve educational opportunities within these countries. The 20 countries are as follows: Benin, Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Djibouti, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia.