Gen Z is Unprepared for College

Recent headlines have been hard to ignore:

[C]ollege professors reading course texts aloud because students can’t manage the reading on their own.

At first glance, it feels like moral panic. Or clickbait. Or another “kids these days” moment.

But beneath the noise is a real signal—one that matters deeply for families thinking about college readiness, gap years, and what it actually takes to thrive after high school.

This isn’t just about reading novels.
It’s about attention, endurance, confidence, and independence—the quiet skills that higher education assumes but no longer reliably teaches.

Let’s separate what’s exaggerated from what’s real, and focus on what parents and students can do now.

What’s Actually Breaking Down

Faculty across a wide range of universities, elite and non-elite alike, are reporting a similar pattern.

Students often struggle to:

• Sustain attention through long, dense texts
• Follow multi-step arguments
• Read independently before class
• Translate written material into discussion, analysis, or writing

This isn’t about intelligence. Many of these students are bright, motivated, and ambitious.

The issue is academic stamina.

How did we get here?

Several forces converged:

1. K–12 incentives shifted
Graduation rates, test optics, and parent satisfaction quietly replaced depth, struggle, and mastery. Students learned how to get through school—not how to wrestle with ideas.

2. The pandemic accelerated everything
Interrupted schooling, uneven remote learning, and test-optional admissions weakened both skill development and honest feedback loops.

3. Reading habits changed
Students were trained, often unintentionally, to:

• skim for answers
• rely on summaries
• treat reading as information extraction, not meaning-making

4. Technology reshaped attention
Video-first feeds and AI summaries reward speed and surface comprehension. Long-form reading now feels harder, even when the student is capable.

The result?
Many students arrive at college having rarely practiced slow, independent reading under cognitive load.

Why This Matters Beyond College

This isn’t just an academic issue.

The same skills required to read a 25-page article are required to:

• onboard at a serious job
• evaluate contracts or policies
• learn unfamiliar domains
• think independently under pressure

In other words, academic stamina = professional stamina.

When students lack it, anxiety rises. Avoidance follows. Confidence erodes.
Lowered expectations then feel compassionate, but often delay growth.

What Colleges Are Doing (and the Tension Inside It)

Some professors are adapting:

• smaller reading chunks
• more in-class reading
• fewer high-pressure exams

Others worry this reinforces dependency and lowers long-term capacity.

Both sides are responding to the same reality:

Students aren’t broken—but they are under-trained for the kind of independence college assumes.

That gap is where families can intervene constructively.

What Parents Can Do (Without Panicking)

The goal is not to “fix” your child.
It’s to rebuild confidence with depth.

Here’s what actually helps.

1. Normalize Struggle With Hard Texts

If reading feels hard, that’s not failure—it’s training. Avoid framing difficulty as a problem to eliminate.

Instead:

“This is supposed to feel heavy at first.”

2. Rebuild Reading Endurance Gradually

Think miles, not sprints.

• Start with 10–15 pages of serious text
• Move to 20–30 pages over time
• Prioritize completing a full argument, not skimming

Consistency beats volume.

3. Shift From “Did You Read?” to “What Did You Wrestle With?”

Better questions:

• “What confused you?”
• “Where did the author lose you?”
• “What would you argue back?”

This builds ownership and agency.

4. Encourage Writing as a Reading Tool

Short reflections, marginal notes, or even voice memos help students process rather than perform comprehension.

5. Consider Transitional Pathways

For some students, the best preparation isn’t immediate full-time college.

Gap years, research programs, internships, or structured reading-and-writing intensives can dramatically strengthen readiness—without stigma.

A Reframe for Students

If you’re a student reading this:

Struggling with reading does not mean you don’t belong in college.
It means you’re being asked to do something you haven’t been trained to do yet.

That’s fixable.

The students who thrive long-term aren’t the ones who never struggle.
They’re the ones who relearn how to sit with difficulty.

The Deeper Question Families Should Ask

The real issue isn’t:

“Is my child college-ready?”

It’s:

“Can my child engage deeply, independently, and with confidence when no one is watching?”

That skill matters in college.
It matters in work.
It matters in life.

GiftedTalented.com helps families navigate exactly this transition—not with fear, but with clarity and practical pathways forward.

Because the future doesn’t belong to the fastest skimmers.

It belongs to those who can slow down, think deeply, and stand on their own understanding.