… I believed that because of its weaknesses, the report was dangerous in its potential for misuse.
~ Joanne Yatvin, from Education Week (2003). Educator, former president of the National Council of Teachers of English, and member of the National Reading Panel (1997-2000).
In 2021, I advocated for a New National Reading Panel (NRP). It has been 26 years since the old one, and reading instruction has become a plethora of programs, most peddling the so-called Science of Reading (SoR), many online, exorbitantly profitable, whether research demonstrates a program’s worth or not.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro (CT) has called for a reconvening of the NRP (See the video below). A new NRP would be welcome if it fixed the problems of the old NRP, not rubber-stamping ideology. Otherwise, it would be a waste of time and tax dollars. What’s the point if only one side of the reading debate gets airtime?
DeLauro, a Democrat with whom I often agree, expresses great enthusiasm for the SoR, the old National Reading Panel, and the Mississippi Miracle (discussed below). She’s not alone. Many governors are climbing on board the SoR train.
A new panel would have to include classroom teachers, especially early learning and special education teachers, with degrees in reading, as they were left off the last panel.
There would need to be more inclusive research questioning the SoR, addressing the failures of policies, such as No Child Left Behind and the Every Child Succeeds Act, and the money spent on Race to the Top and the Common Core State Standards, which have affected curriculum and how and what students learn for years.
Would they consider a variety of reading concerns from prominent educators in the field of literacy?
DeLauro is from Connecticut, and I wonder if she has discussed reading with Professor Emeritus of Literacy, Elementary, and Early Childhood Education from Central Connecticut State, Jesse Turner. She needs only look at his podcasts. Here’s an older one I chose about assessment, with a beautiful ring story, worth the whole presentation.
Would a new NRP refer to the writings of Dr. Stephen Krashen, a long-time leader not only in second language acquisition but phonics and reading? They’d read Krashen’s Phi Delta Kappan report Whole Language and the Great Plummet of 1987-92: AN URBAN LEGEND FROM CALIFORNIA.
They wouldn’t ignore the Boston Globe Op Ed, The fallacy of settled science in literacy by Nancy Carlsson-Paige, professor emerita at Lesley University and Lexington school superintendent Julie Hackett.
They state:
Science of reading laws prescribe or prohibit specific reading programs according to the “science of reading’’ criteria. The approved programs implement a singular model of reading in which the explicit teaching of decoding/phonics skills dominates reading instruction. Many approved science of reading programs are scripted lessons that tell teachers what to teach, when to teach, and how to teach. School authorities monitor teachers to ensure they are following the script.
Professor PL Thomas, writes about literacy and discusses concerns about the SoR, including retention. He listed research reports worthy of consideration.
Professor Elena Aydarova’s research What You See Is Not What You Get: Science of Reading Reforms as a Guise for Standardization, Centralization, and Privatization is critical.
Thomas Ultican wrote about billionaires driving the Science of Reading.
Would they include professors like Rachel Gabriel whose research (2020) raises questions. What happened to Success for All and Reading Recovery, two very different programs but considered successful by Johns Hopkins University and the National Center on Intensive Intervention?
Will a new NRP look into the concerns surrounding technology and big business including AI?
Historian Diane Ravitch has repeatedly written about her concerns surrounding the SoR. She recently added in a Substack essay:
The problem with “the science of reading” is that it’s not new. American schools have tried it, dropped it, tried it, dropped it, on and on.
The74 report by Jessica Harkay describes The Robust Reading Comprehension Report. Recent findings show children gain phonetic skills but lack comprehension skills later.
These are similar findings from the Reading First Impact Study (2008-2009) grown from the old NRP report. Reading First had a statistically significant positive impact on first graders’ decoding skills but did not produce a statistically significant impact on student reading comprehension test scores in grades one, two, or three.
They’d study Robert J. Tierney (Literacy Professor at the University of British Columbia) and P David Pearson’s (emeritus professor, the University of California, Berkeley) Fact-Checking the Science of Reading: Opening Up the Conversation.
They wouldn’t delete Heinemann publishing and the authors’ great reading and writing ideas and information, including Nancy Atwell and the late Kylene Beers, or other books and papers that might not fit the narrow parameters of the SoR.
Would they cover Crouch and Cambourne’s Made for Learning: How the Conditions of Learning Guide Teaching Decisions and Wyse and Hacking’s The Balancing Act: An Evidence-Based Approach to Teaching Phonics, Reading and Writing?
They’d reread books by Kozol and Ohanian, and many others, that teach us to celebrate children in America. These are only a few suggestions.
Is it a miracle or grade retention?
Mississippi and other states in the south have been getting attention for raising reading scores. The teachers involved, and all who work hard to help students learn to read deserve credit. But serious questions remain about the long-term gains of these state programs focused on the SoR.
Students look to be doing well in 4th grade, but most of these states have one thing in common. They hold third graders not performing well back, before 4th grade testing. Professor Andy Johnson another vocal student advocate and reading researcher, to prove a point, notes he can make Mississippi 4th graders taller. How? Hold back all the shorter students in third grade!
Research is clear, retention is stigmatizing. Students might initially do well, but later not so much. It’s also unnecessary. There are many ways to address reading difficulties without holding children back or pushing them forward without help.
A recent report showed benefits in Mississippi could be dissipating by 8th grade. There’s also a risk retained students will drop out later. In other words, it isn’t a miracle socially.
For years, the phonics v. whole language debate, and later balanced literacy, has lit a spark aptly labeled the Reading Wars. It has hurt instruction and there has been concern it’s intentional to make teachers and public schools appear to fail, for school privatization to take place, by focusing on drill that’s easily presented by tutors, or students in front of screens.
Children need a well-rounded curriculum in reading, developmentally appropriate, geared towards individualized needs, with phonics instruction and a variety of other reading activities.
A new NRP would have to include the voices that care about children, include parents, and those who are sincere and capable of pulling together the research, without having a financial interest in play. It would be truly an inclusive, democratic group. They would respectfully debate and argue and come to a workable solution to what constitutes great reading instruction.
Could Americans trust a new NRP? For what it’s worth I used to think so. But lately, and I don’t mean to be cynical, but after all these years, and witnessing what’s happening in the country today, I don’t have much hope for this to happen. There are too many individuals profiting from education and sadly greed rules supreme. I hope I’m proven wrong.
DeLauro can be seen here on a panel, 13:30 and 1:47:20 discussing a reconvening of the NRP.
References
Yatvin, J. (2003, April 30). I Told You So! The Misinterpretation and Misuse of The National Reading Panel Report. Education Week. Retrieved from https://www.edweek.org/teaching-learning/opinion-i-told-you-so-the-misinterpretation-and-misuse-of-the-national-reading-panel-report/2003/04.
Gabriel, R. (2020). The Future of the Science of Reading. The Reading Teacher, 74(1), 11–18. https://doi.org/10.1002/trtr.1924.
Schwartz, S. (2026, February 10). Congress wants to know what makes the ‘Science of Reading’ work. Education Week. Retrieved from https://www.edweek.org/teaching-learning/congress-wants-to-know-what-makes-the-science-of-reading-work/2026/02.
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