It’s no secret that reading is the foundation for academic success. From kindergarten to third grade, a child is learning to read. By third grade, a child is reading to learn.
Sadly, all too often, a child who starts behind, stays behind. Reading struggles are strongly linked to difficulties in school (academic, social, and behavioral). 74% of children whose reading skills are less than sufficient by third grade have a drastically reduced likelihood of graduating from high school (Strategies for Children “Turning The Page Report”)
Below are just a few of the ways early reading failure isn’t just costing the child, but it’s costing us all:
- Holding a child back a grade, which costs nearly $11,000 per child annually. Currently in Virginia, we’re spending almost $80 million a year on children who are held back in grades K-3.
- High school dropout costs society $250,000 through lower earnings and benefits that create costs for public assistance programs and efforts to offset the dropout’s reduced contribution to society (ReadyNation, “Paying Later: The High Costs of Failing to Invest in Young Children”).
- In Virginia, of the 97,023 students who entered high school in 2008 and scheduled to graduate in 2012, nearly 9,000 are missing in action, because they dropped out, failed to finish on time, or were identified as “long-term absent.”
The chart below from Strategies for Children does a great job illustrating just how important third grade reading is and how poor reading skills are costing us:
Our reading and academic failures are costing Virginians! In fact, 61% of our fourth graders are reading below grade level.
Isn’t it time we made our kids and their education a priority?