Skip to main content
    Reading and math for every child

    Reading and math for every child: Every child reading, and doing math, by age ten.

    An estimated 70% of ten-year-olds in low- and middle-income countries can't read and understand a simple text. Teaching children at the level they're at helps them catch up, for about $9.63 a child over two years in Zambia's national program.

    Try it in the sliderTalk to Ryan

    Ryan K. Hertel · heyitskenton

    The problem

    What we're up against.

    • Learning poverty.

      An estimated 70% of ten-year-olds in low- and middle-income countries can't read and understand a simple text, by a World Bank simulation.

    • In school, but not learning.

      Of the 387 million primary-age children who can't read proficiently, 262 million are sitting in a classroom.

    • Around the world.

      By the end of primary school, only 58% of students reach minimum proficiency in reading, and 44% in math. In Africa, only one in five do.

    • In America too.

      Around 40% of American fourth graders read below the basic level, the most since 2002, and 45% of twelfth graders are below basic in math, the most ever.

    What works

    Proven, and ready to grow.

    • Teaching at the right level.

      Grouping children by what they can actually do, for part of the school day, raised test scores in six randomized trials in India.

    • Short camps, real reading.

      In Uttar Pradesh, after short learning camps, 49% of children could read, against 24% of children without them.

    • A whole country.

      In the first randomized trial of a national, government-run version, in Zambia, children gained in reading and math, and two years later they scored higher on the country's seventh-grade exams.

    • A great buy.

      A global expert panel rates teaching at the right level among its most cost-effective approaches, and a benefit-cost analysis finds about $65 in benefits for every dollar spent.

    • Tutoring works too.

      In randomized trials, tutoring has consistently substantial effects, and daily math tutoring in Chicago high schools raised scores by 0.18 to 0.40 standard deviations.

    What a family could fund

    Where the money goes furthest.

    • TaRL Africa.

      TaRL Africa reports reaching 13.4 million children in 20 countries with its partners, at less than $10 a child, and an independent evaluator estimated it could put another $10 million to good use over three years.

    • Pratham, in India.

      Working with India's state governments, Pratham's approach has reached more than 76 million students.

    • From pilot to national policy.

      In Zambia, donor-funded pilots led the government to roll the program out to every school, and it now reaches more than 1 million students a year.

    • Lessons by phone.

      Across five countries, tutoring by phone call and text message delivered about four years of high-quality instruction for every $100 spent.

    • Books for millions.

      Room to Read reports that 16.5 million children benefited from its literacy and girls' education programs in 2025.

    Honest limits

    What money can't promise.

    • The evidence is mixed.

      An independent review counts 25 significant results against 21 null ones in trials of this approach, and a near-copy of the best Indian model had no effect in Assam.

    • Scaling up is hard.

      Large rollouts by government teachers often show weaker or inconsistent results, and in Zambia only a third of children attended a catch-up class on a given day.

    • More isn't always better.

      In Zambia, extra teacher training that doubled the cost per student added no extra learning.

    • Tutoring is costly, and shrinks at scale.

      High-dosage tutoring costs about $3,500 to $4,300 a student a year, and its effects drop sharply as programs grow.

    • Gains can fade.

      The effects of programs like these on learning commonly fade over time.

    Hard questions

    Asked and answered.

    1. You might ask

      Wouldn't spending more on schools fix this?

      Ryan

      Not by itself: poorer countries raised spending on primary schools by about $137 a student, and the link between spending and learning has been historically weak. What the money buys matters more than how much.

    2. You might ask

      Don't these gains just fade away?

      Ryan

      They often shrink, but fading often sits alongside gains that last, and in Zambia, children scored higher on national exams two years after the program ended.

    3. You might ask

      Isn't this the government's job?

      Ryan

      Governments pay for most schooling, which is why private money does the most good funding the pilots and trials that governments then take over, as Zambia's did.

    In the slider

    See what your fortune could do here.

    Reading and math for every child

    The slider prices this cause with these numbers:

    • About $9.63 puts a child through two years of catch-up classes in Zambia's national program, support costs included.
    • The whole need here is the 387 million primary-age children who can't read proficiently, a count from before the pandemic, so it's likely higher now.
    • The price buys a place in a proven program, not a guaranteed reader: the gains in Zambia were modest, and only a third of children attended on a given day.
    Try it in the sliderTalk to Ryan

    More of the Blueprint

    Keep reading.

    23 more chapters on the way

    Back to Keep 100

    Sources

    Every number in this chapter, and where it came from.

    1. Source 1: 70% of 10-Year-Olds now in Learning Poverty, Unable to Read and Understand a Simple Text (opens in a new tab)

      World Bank, 23 June 2022. Checked 16 October 2026.

      A simulation, with UNESCO, UNICEF and others, not a count.

    2. Source 2: Targeting Foundational Skills to Improve Learning at Scale in Zambia (opens in a new tab)

      J-PAL. Checked 16 October 2026.

      A randomized trial of Zambia's national program, in more than a thousand schools.

    3. Source 3: 617 million children and adolescents not getting the minimum in reading and math (opens in a new tab)

      UNESCO, 21 September 2017. Checked 16 October 2026.

      The newest official global count, from before the pandemic.

    4. Source 4: Monitoring SDG 4: Learning (opens in a new tab)

      UNESCO Global Education Monitoring Report. Checked 16 October 2026.

    5. Source 5: The Nation's Report Card Shows Declines in Reading, Some Progress in 4th Grade Math (opens in a new tab)

      National Assessment Governing Board, 29 January 2025. Checked 16 October 2026.

    6. Source 6: Nation's Report Card Shows Declines in 8th-Grade Science and 12th-Grade Math and Reading (opens in a new tab)

      National Assessment Governing Board, 9 September 2025. Checked 16 October 2026.

    7. Source 7: Tailoring instruction to students' learning levels to increase learning (opens in a new tab)

      J-PAL, January 2019. Checked 16 October 2026.

    8. Source 8: 2023 Cost-Effective Approaches to Improve Global Learning (Smart Buys) (opens in a new tab)

      Global Education Evidence Advisory Panel, May 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.

      Convened by the World Bank, UNICEF and the UK and US aid agencies.

    9. Source 9: Improving Learning in Low- and Lower-Middle-Income Countries (Angrist and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis, 18 August 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.

    10. Source 10: The Promise of Tutoring for PreK-12 Learning: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Experimental Evidence (Nickow, Oreopoulos and Quan) (opens in a new tab)

      American Educational Research Journal, 27 November 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.

    11. Source 11: Not Too Late: Improving Academic Outcomes among Adolescents (Guryan and others) (opens in a new tab)

      American Economic Review, March 2023. Checked 16 October 2026.

      Two randomized trials in Chicago high schools.

    12. Source 12: Teaching at the Right Level Africa (opens in a new tab)

      The Life You Can Save. Checked 16 October 2026.

      The charity's own figures.

    13. Source 13: Teaching at the Right Level (TaRL) Africa (opens in a new tab)

      Founders Pledge, 16 January 2024. Checked 16 October 2026.

      An independent evaluator's estimate, now more than two years old.

    14. Source 14: Teaching at the Right Level to accelerate learning (opens in a new tab)

      J-PAL. Checked 16 October 2026.

    15. Source 15: National study in Zambia finds a focus on teaching the basics leads to broad learning gains over time (opens in a new tab)

      J-PAL, 18 March 2026. Checked 16 October 2026.

    16. Source 16: Mobile education builds resilience during shocks in five countries (Angrist and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Nature, 9 September 2026. Checked 16 October 2026.

      Five randomized trials.

    17. Source 17: 2025 Annual Report (opens in a new tab)

      Room to Read. Checked 16 October 2026.

      The organization's own, preliminary figures.

    18. Source 18: The Limits of a Great Buy: What Rigorous Evidence Reveals about Teaching at the Right Level (Ardington, Menendez and Thunde) (opens in a new tab)

      University of Cape Town (AFLEARN), January 2026. Checked 16 October 2026.

      A critical review, written before Zambia's results.

    19. Source 19: Not Too Late: Improving Academic Outcomes Among Adolescents (Working Paper 28531) (opens in a new tab)

      National Bureau of Economic Research, March 2021. Checked 16 October 2026.

    20. Source 20: What Impacts Should We Expect From Tutoring at Scale? Exploring Meta-Analytic Generalizability (Kraft, Schueler and Falken) (opens in a new tab)

      Review of Educational Research, 5 June 2026. Checked 16 October 2026.

    21. Source 21: Fadeout and persistence of intervention impacts on social-emotional and cognitive skills in children and adolescents: A meta-analytic review of randomized controlled trials (Hart and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Psychological Bulletin, October 2024. Checked 16 October 2026.

    22. Source 22: Persistence and Fade-Out of Educational-Intervention Effects: Mechanisms and Potential Solutions (Bailey and others) (opens in a new tab)

      Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14 October 2020. Checked 16 October 2026.