Gen Z Arriving at College Unable to Read

"it's not even an inability to critically think. It's an inability to read sentences."

"I feel like I am tap dancing and having to read things aloud because there's no way that anyone read it the night before,"

"Even when you read it in class with them, there's so much they can't process about the very words that are on the page."

Many incoming Gen Z students exhibit weak sentence-level reading comprehension, prompting higher-education instructors to lower academic benchmarks and change classroom practices. Instructors are reducing or eliminating outside reading assignments and using in-class oral reading and line-by-line recitation to compensate. Students frequently struggle to process the literal words on the page even when text is read aloud together. Contributing factors include pandemic-era learning disruptions, persistent problems in the K–12 system, and a cultural shift toward video and audio media. These trends create practical challenges for maintaining traditional academic rigor and workload expectations.

Read at Futurism