Reading is Vitally Important

By Andy Kober

Comic books got me hooked on reading.
I cannot remember exactly how it started but I was a voracious reader even as a child. Laugh if you will but comic books played a huge role in me developing an interest in reading for pleasure, which translated into reading for educational purposes, and that ultimately led to a career that I enjoyed.
I became a voracious reader across a wide variety of genres, and it is still an enjoyable pastime, though not as often as I would like.
The importance of reading cannot be overstated as those who cannot read well will have considerable problems functioning in today’s world. Yet testing conducted in 2025 revealed reading proficiency among high school students continues to fall, with 32 percent of high school seniors dropping below the “basic” level as recently reported by CNN.
This is happening despite the federal government spending billions of dollars every year on public education programs.
There is not a single issue that has caused this, and the problem is not new. In fact, the National Assessment of Education Progress reports the downward slide of reading proficiency has been going on for a decade.
It has been said that success has many parents while failure is a lonely orphan and that is exactly the case when attempting to understand why students are falling behind in the ability to read and read well. Home schooling by parents who barely graduated from high school, if they did at all, is part of the problem. Another issue involves teachers giving students grades to join protests instead of achieving work in the classroom. And there are too many cases where teachers spend classroom time indoctrinating students in their personal social and political beliefs instead of academic subjects.
STUDENTS today have a host of advantages when it comes to education, yet when it comes to being able to read and comprehend, they are falling behind previous generations that utilized chalkboards in classrooms without air conditioning.
Carol Jago, associate director of the California Reading and Literature Project at UCLA, notes that in the past students read about 20 books during a school year but now many are down to just three, and some even less than that.
Lesley Muldoon, executive director of the National Assessment Governing Board, reports that test scores show more students are not reaching what would be considered “basic” achievement across subject areas and said, “These students are taking their next steps in life with fewer skills and less knowledge in core academics than their predecessors a decade ago. This is happening at a time when rapid advancements in technology and society demands more of future workers and citizens, not less.”
READING is the basic foundation upon which education is based, yet students are falling behind and in too many cases that failure is not being addressed by public school systems.
So the answer is – parents developing in their children an enjoyment of reading beginning at an early age. Not every child will like comic books, but there is reading material available that will appeal to every child. It is up to parents to find that interest and nurture it. It is also up to parents to hold school systems accountable in providing quality academic education. Only then will the downward slide be addressed.
That’s my opinion.
A newspaper columnist for over 35 years, Andy Kober can be reached by email at andykober@hotmail.com