Kids hardly read anymore, for pleasure or for school, so it’s no wonder reading scores continue to drop. The NAEP (“the Nation’s Report Card”) shows that in 2024, 70 percent of eighth graders could not perform at a proficient level in reading assessments. Worse, 33 percent could not even read and understand texts at the NAEP’s “basic” level, which denotes “partial mastery” of fundamental skills.
In light of these problems, a new model bill from the Ethics and Public Policy Center aims at getting kids to read again. Even better, it sets its sights on the best type of reading material a kid could have: real books.
