Is there really a “reading crisis” in universities?

Reposted from my LinkedIn articles, first published March 1, 2026.

Phil Baty recently asked whether universities are facing a “reading crisis”, as a generation raised in digital-first classrooms begins to question the relevance of books. He referenced developments in Sweden, where universities are now required to track and report the use of course literature.

From my experience in the UK, the issue he identifies is real.

I’ve marked essays and critical reflections that were clearly not the product of sustained reading. A common pattern was what we used to call parachuted references: write the essay first (often at the last minute), then search for sources to drop in afterwards to legitimise it. It benefits no one. Not the student. Not the marker. And certainly not the discipline.

That’s not how academic writing works. You read. You think. You write. You iterate. But reading has to come first.

This was before AI, incidentally. So we shouldn’t blame new technologies for a much older pedagogic challenge.

Some years ago, I was involved in a project led by Paul Stevens at Southampton Solent University. Paul designed and delivered an action research intervention based on a simple but powerful insight: if students weren’t reading independently, perhaps we needed to read with them.

The results were significant.

Confidence increased. Discussion improved. Written work strengthened. Most importantly, students began to see academic reading not as a gatekeeping ritual but as a skill — something learnable, structured, and purposeful.

Paul didn’t just try this in one room and move on. He researched it properly, tested it, refined it, and disseminated it through PG Cert teaching and learning programmes. It was an excellent example of action research in practice: a genuine teaching problem addressed with method, care, and evidence.

His open-access paper sets out the approach clearly:

Stevens, P. (2022). I’m (not) an academic … get me out of here! In A. Middleton, I. Gowers, P. Oprandi, & T. Betts (Eds.), 100 Ideas for Active Learning (pp. 292–295). University of Sussex Library. https://doi.org/10.20919/OPXR1032/33

And here is a video from one of the pilot workshops:

You can also watch it on YouTube https://youtu.be/SBNhRUApQ5U?

If we are serious about addressing a reading crisis, I would suggest this: before we regulate reading, we might need to teach it more explicitly. Not defend books in the abstract. Not lament declining standards. But design structured reading practices that build confidence and judgement.

The interesting question now is how this evolves. If AI becomes part of the reading ecology — as it undoubtedly will — then perhaps the next iteration of this work is not whether students read alone, but how they read with tools. How we prevent cognitive and evaluative offloading. How we ensure that judgement still sits with the student.

Paul’s work feels newly relevant in that context.

Sometimes the solution isn’t surveillance of reading lists. It’s teaching craft well.