25 Million Kids Can't Read. Society Accepts It. That's the Real Problem.
Literacy rates among graduating seniors are at their lowest in 30 years. 25% of young adults are functionally illiterate. And we're normalizing it.
25 million children in the U.S. cannot read proficiently. Literacy rates among graduating seniors are at their lowest in 30 years. 25% of young adults ages 16 to 24 are functionally illiterate. Daily reading for pleasure dropped from 27% to 14% among 13-year-olds in 11 years.
None of this surprises me. Societal conditions and technology pushed this. Entertainment replaced reading. Attention collapsed. The decline predates the pandemic. So we can't blame one thing. This is systemic.
The root is family structure and parental intervention. Some parents have the time and attention to intervene on literacy. Many don't. Societal conditions make it harder for parents to give their children that time. So it becomes a two-sided problem: parents overwhelmed and children left behind.
But here's what bothers me more: functional illiteracy is becoming acceptable. Some people do minimal reading. That's fine for their jobs. But it's a choice. And we're normalizing the choice not to read.
That's where free will enters. Everyone has the ability to read. Not everyone chooses to. And once you accept that choice, the problem becomes infinite.
Reversing this in five years requires something radical. Not better schools. Not more funding. Interactive technology that reframes reading as engaging and valuable. It needs to be flipped on its head. Make reading exciting again. Make it active. Make it something kids want to do, not something they're forced to endure.
I don't know if that technology exists yet. But that's what it would take.
Functional illiteracy is becoming acceptable. And once you normalize the choice not to read, the problem becomes infinite.
This isn't a school funding problem. It isn't a curriculum problem. It's a cultural problem — entertainment replaced reading, attention collapsed, and society mostly shrugged. The data has been moving in the wrong direction for over a decade.
The path forward is radical reframing. Not worksheets. Not mandates. Interactive technology that makes reading feel like something worth doing. Something that competes with a screen instead of cowering from it. That's the only version of this that works.