Literacy Data and its impact on the Nation • Illiteracy has become such a serious problem in our country that 130 million adults are now unable to read a simple story to their children • 21% of adults in the US are illiterate in 2022 • 54% of adults have a literacy below 6th grade level • 45 million are functionally illiterate and read below a 5th grade level • 44% of the American adults do not read a book in a year • The Top 3 states for highest child literacy rates were Massachusetts, Maryland