This op-ed by Secretary Rod Paige appeared in The Tallahassee Democrat on June 21, 2003.
The National Assessment of Educational Progress just released its latest reading report card, and the good news is that we are making progress toward our goal of raising a nation of strong readers. But much work remains.
The current NAEP test has been measuring the pulse of our youngsters' ability to read for a decade now. After years of poor performances, scores are starting to turn upward and the achievement gap has narrowed between minority students and their white counterparts. Children eligible for free and reduced-price school lunch showed improvement in their scores as well.
All these statistics prove that all children—despite their economic status or racial or ethnic backgrounds—can indeed learn.
But this is just one part of a larger snapshot. Taken as a whole, today's NAEP reading scores underscore a point I've made many times: Too many youngsters in our schools have little or no grasp of reading.
The scores released Thursday showed 64 percent of our nation's seniors were not proficient in reading. Right behind them are fourth- and eighth-graders, 68 percent of whom are not proficient either.
Reading is the foundation of education. If you are a poor reader then your math or science or any other textbook might as well be a fire hydrant for all the good it does.
So it is critical that children learn this important skill as soon as they enter school. It is also vital that children with difficulties learning to read get help right away, because research tells us that those who are not good readers by third grade have almost no chance of catching up.
The NAEP results bear that out. The longer children stay in the system, the worse they perform.
Many drop out. Others graduate with inferior skills. This means that our work force is ill equipped to compete in the 21st-century global eonomy. Employers reported in 1999 that 38 percent of applicants lacked the skills for the job—twice the number they saw in 1996.
The cost to the children and to society is enormous. Youngsters who never learn to read grow into adults who very often wind up on the fringes of society—working dead-end jobs, living on public assistance or serving time in prison. Note that about one-third of prison inmates are unlikely to read well enough to fill out an application or read a map.
All of this lends a special urgency to the president's call for America's schools to stop business as usual and start teaching what works when it comes to reading.
To help in this mission, the president rallied a bipartisan consensus in Congress to pass the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001—a sweeping overhaul of our education system that combines reforms and resources to improve America's schools.
Important parts of that effort are the president's Reading First and Early Reading First initiatives that zero in on solving this reading crisis through research-based instruction.
Every budget cycle, he has backed his commitment to education. His latest budget boosts 2004 education funding to $53.1 billion—an $11 billion increase since he took office. His commitment to improving reading also includes significant federal funding—almost $1 billion in 2003 alone and more than $1 billion proposed again in his 2004 budget.
Some defenders of the status quo said No Child Left Behind wouldn't fly. They said states and parents would balk. But survey after survey has showed parents standing shoulder to shoulder with the president on his education efforts. And the states have rolled up their sleeves and knuckled down to the task at hand.
Last week, we celebrated a historic milestone at the White House. For the first time in the history of American public education, every state in the nation now has an accountability plan in place. Every child counts.
We may not always see eye to eye, but we all can agree on one thing: Every child deserves the opportunity to learn and succeed in school—and in life.
And it all starts with reading. President Bush has given us the tools to create a nation of readers. My hope is that today's NAEP scores will encourage more schools to take stock of their reading programs and do what it takes for every child to become a good reader—early—when it does the most good.
The clock is ticking. The children in our nation's classrooms only have one shot at being young. And they are counting on us.
Rod Paige
U.S. Secretary of Education
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