A college teacher in Pennsylvania has raised concerns about students entering higher education with poor reading and critical thinking skills. The woman, who said she has been teaching for 12 years, claimed that many students are performing at a fifth- or sixth-grade reading level despite being enrolled in college. She expressed fears about society’s future, and several netizens appeared equally troubled by her observations.
The teacher, Tina Midkiff, shared her thoughts in a video posted on Instagram last week. Reading from a note, she said, “I have seen a drop in literacy, in cognitive thinking skills of students… many of them are functionally illiterate.”
She described them as being “incapable of paying attention to anything more than five minutes” and largely uninterested in learning. “I no longer feel like I’m teaching college courses. I feel like I’m teaching middle school classes, and many students still fail these classes,” Midkiff said.
The teacher said that thinking about what this decline could mean for society had left her “absolutely petrified,” particularly as these students eventually enter the workforce.
Netizens React to Pennsylvania Teacher’s Claims
In the comments, several people shared her concern. One Instagram user wrote, “We are in big, big trouble.” Another commented, “The educational system has been stripped down to absolutely nothing.” A third said, “It is scary to think about the generation that is coming up in the public education school system at present. Many of the children are so far behind, but is [sic] still being passed to the next grade.”
Some wondered how students with such poor reading abilities could qualify for college admission in the first place. “How do they get into college being illiterate? Isn’t there some kind of entrance exam?” one person asked. Another comment read, “How did their application get approved? Colleges and universities need to vet applicants to uphold the integrity of the system and the degree.”
Some viewers also believed schools needed to enforce stricter academic standards rather than allowing students to advance without meeting them. “Boot them out. Not everyone needs to go to college,” one said, while another urged, “Stop passing them!! Fail them when they don’t achieve!!”
National Assessments Show Declining Reading Performance
Recent national assessment results also point to declining reading performance among American students.
According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), commonly known as the Nation’s Report Card, 32% of American 12th-grade students scored below the Basic level in reading in 2024. That was the highest percentage recorded since the assessment began in 1992. The results also showed that only 35% of 12th graders scored at or above the Proficient level, while the national average reading score fell compared to 2019.
Another report from ACT revealed that just 39% of the nearly 1.4 million high school graduates who took its assessment in 2025 met the college readiness benchmark for reading.
However, these findings do not establish that most college students read at a fifth- or sixth-grade level or are illiterate, as the Pennsylvania teacher suggested. The assessments measure different aspects of academic readiness, and neither directly supports that specific claim.
Nevertheless, the results indicate that a considerable number of American students are leaving high school without meeting established reading benchmarks.
