By Mia Kelley
How can books stand a chance against smartphones in the war for attention? That’s a question many are asking after the recent “Nation’s Report Card” displayed lower literacy rates in young elementary students. Even through a college-aged lens, less students gravitate toward literature for leisure with so many screens and digital allures at their fingertips.
Literary habits start young, and fewer American students are reading at or above proficient literacy levels every year. According to the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress, 40% of fourth graders read below basic literacy levels. There is a real literacy crisis in the country, and students have the chance to help future generations wield the skills they need to ease it.
Oliva Marshall, a senior elementary education student, is concerned about the state of literacy and comprehension in young students and what the realization of below-average reading skills can do to their mental health.
“It breaks my heart to think about how many students struggle with reading, especially because literacy is so much more than just being able to read words on a page” she said.
Marshall recognizes that there are a variety of factors that play into students’ motivations to read and not to read: digital distractions, but socioeconomic ones as well.
“How can we expect a child to focus on the letters in a word…when they are worried about where their next meal is coming from, whether they feel safe at home, or if they have someone who genuinely cares about them?” Marshall said.
Addressing these outlying factors is crucial to her values as a future teacher, she said, and she wants to make her students feel comfortable enough to work through the challenges that deter them from achieving learning goals.
In another vein, declining literacy levels coincide with a diminished chance for students to experience and understand the arts, especially literary ones. Sophomore Angelica Salva is a drama education student with misgivings about this literary barrier, as she believes the two go together.
“Art is feeling, and feelings are so important for kids to be expressing at this age, to take in other people’s feelings empathetically,” she said. “I don’t know what that [the literacy crisis] means for this new generation of artists, but I’m concerned.”
Salva said that her experiences expressing emotions through theatre and music growing up were integral to feeling like she belonged in school and societal structures. She hopes to become a drama and theatre teacher following graduation to be a bridge between students and the arts.
She said her goal is to be an educator who exposes her students to the “widest variety of arts” that she can, not just her own biased personal favorites. In doing so, Salva said she desires to present something that helps students develop a repeated habit of consuming art and expressing their feelings and creative ideas in safe spaces.
Reading scripts, reciting lines and deciphering plays all require literacy and comprehension skills, especially analytical ones. Encouraging her students to start reading young will be vital to their ability to absorb material and eventually perform it.
“Literacy is the baseline to a whole education, and so if [students are] not taking in information, …what’s going to come of our societal structures in the future and the roles that this next generation plays within them?” Salva said.
The implications of a diminishingly literate society can be disheartening, but there remain ways that college students can model the importance of reading and foster positive emotions to emulate a hunger for learning.
Students in the Alpha chapter of Pi Beta Phi at the University of Arkansas aim to alleviate these implications of low literacy rates by volunteering at numerous local schools and organizations in Fayetteville. Cambelle Hawkins, Director of Service and Philanthropy for Pi Beta Phi, said the sorority has members volunteering “every single day of every week of the entire year.”
Through their “Lunch Buddy,” “Pre-K Buddy” and “Champions are Readers” programs, sorority members sign up to volunteer at local schools such as Leverett and Asbell elementary schools to spend time with young students during lunch, class or reading time during their school days.
“It really goes much deeper than learning how to read,” Hawkins said.” It teaches them what it looks like to learn to love to read,” Hawkins said.
More importantly, she said the programs allow members to become a familiar face to their buddies, helping them grow meaningful and consistent friendships with them that can stimulate excitement for their education.
“All you have to be is a friend, because that might be the best 30 minutes of their week,” she said.
While the programs that Pi Beta Phi works with are offered to their sorority members, others still have ways to impact the next generation’s learning and reading habits.
Hawkins’ advice to college students concerned about the literacy crisis is to start with those closest to them, such as their younger family members and family friends.
Being a role model of a student in their eyes might mean simply being excited about education and motivating them to think the same way.
“Who in your life can you impact and walk alongside with in their educational journey to encourage them?” she said.
University students may not be the primary faces coaching the current young student generation through phonics and reading exercises, but they still have a responsibility to serve as role models for the next literate generations.
Looking back on her education courses that she has taken as a senior, Marshall has recognized the importance of this responsibility, and she calls other students to illuminate the value of learning to other young minds.
“College students have an incredible opportunity to make a difference in the lives of younger students,” she said. “That could look like volunteering in schools, tutoring struggling readers, reading aloud to children, or just being someone who encourages a child’s love for books… all those little things matter.”