Media reliance on free-market think tank reports distorts the story on reading in the US.

Currently viral on social media is a TikTok video of a teacher lamenting that her students cannot read.

This feeds into the current story about reading being almost daily portrayed by the media, which depends on anecdotes and metaphors despite the recurring rhetoric of “science.”

However, one of the most misleading aspects of the media story about reading is the reliance on free-market think tank reports that fail to meet even the minimum standards of research.

A recent email from Education Week, for example, platformed a new report from the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. The report, filled with charts and footnotes, addresses teacher knowledge and implementation of the “science of reading,” a favorite of conservatives because it is grounded in phonics instruction and “no excuses” ideology.

Fordham is a think tank dedicated to the privatization of education, and their reports, including this one, doesn’t meet the standard of scientific research.

In fact, think tank reports are often propaganda in slick PDFs with end notes and a great deal of data.

This Fordham report is survey data and written by two scholars with no background in literacy.

Think tank reports are dangerous because they look like high-quality research incorporating either end notes or links, most of which readers likely never explore.

Let’s look at some of the links making the foundational claims found in the media about reading:

• Both the Foreword and Introduction establish the reading crisis by linking to a podcast, Sold a Story (Thomas, 2024a; 2024b; 2024c; 2024d).
• Claims about “unscientific approaches” to reading (whole language, three cueing, and balanced literacy) are linked to a Fordham report, a “conceptual article,” and a high-quality research article that shows systematic phonics improves students’ phonic skills but not comprehension (the core finding for decades about phonics instruction).
• The report includes the required link to the National Reading Panel (NRP), a report more than two decades old that was incomplete and has been repeatedly misrepresented in the media. Despite constant claims otherwise, the NRP report found no different between systematic phonics and whole language in terms of comprehension.
• Claims of reading materials not being scientific are linked to a RAND survey.
• The link for grade retention leads to another Fordham report from 2023. Despite that report’s positive spin on retention, the evidence is far more negative in terms of how retention distorts tests data and has negative consequences for those students as adults.
• Also central to this report is the work of NCTQ, founded by Fordham in 2000. NCTQ’s agenda is a subset of Fordham’s, focusing on discrediting teacher education. No report issued by NCTQ has ever withstood the rigor of external review or met the basic standards of scientific research (see Thomas, 2023).

Mainstream education media works as uncritical PR for free-market think tanks and conservative ideology (see the recent charter propaganda in The Atlantic).

The bait-and-switch of the “science of reading” movement as it plays out in the media’s story of reading is that the rhetoric of “science” is propped up on anecdotes, metaphors, podcasts, cherry-picked and misrepresented research, and the incestuous propaganda of free-market think tank reports.

The point of education crisis for conservative think tanks is privatization, not public education reform.

Yet, many continue to buy it.

See Also

Research Contradicts “Science of Reading” Media Story Being Sold

References

Thomas, P.L. (2024a, March). We teach English in times of perpetual crisis: The long (and tedious) history of reading crisis. English Journal, 113(4), 21-26. https://publicationsncte.org/content/journals/10.58680/ej2024113421

Thomas, P.L. (2024b, May). Teaching English in the “science of reading” era: We teach English in times of perpetual crisis: Selling a story of reading. English Journal, 113(5), 16-22. https://publicationsncte.org/content/journals/10.58680/ej2024113516

Thomas, P.L. (2024c, September). We teach English in times of perpetual crisis: The media continue to misread teaching reading and literacy. English Journal, 114(1), 14-19. https://publicationsncte.org/content/journals/10.58680/ej2024114114

Thomas, P.L. (2024d, November). We teach English in times of perpetual crisis: For all ELA teachers, “the time is always now.” English Journal, 114(2), 21-26. https://publicationsncte.org/content/journals/10.58680/ej2024114221

Thomas, P.L. (2023, September). NEPC review: Teacher prep review: Strengthening elementary reading instruction. Boulder, CO: National Education Policy Center. https://nepc.colorado.edu/review/teacher-prep