Berlin Subway Campaign Aims to Improve Adult Reading Skills

The latest Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) results have highlighted a concerning trend in reading literacy among 15-year-olds across the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). In 2025, the average reading score for 15-year-olds was the lowest ever recorded, with a 28-point decline in reading proficiency compared to 2015. This decline is equivalent to about one and a half school years, according to the OECD.

In Germany, the situation is similarly troubling. The 2025 results for reading proficiency were lower than in 2022, and in a longer-term comparison, they were the lowest ever recorded in the country as part of PISA. The Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC 2023) further underscores the issue, revealing that 22 percent of adults in Germany achieve only proficiency level 1 or below in reading skills.

To address this, Friedrich Hasse, a long-time speed-reading instructor in Berlin, emphasizes the need for adults to revisit their reading techniques.

Improved Reading GmbH & Co. KG is drawing attention to this issue through a campaign on Berlin's public transit system. A 20-second ad is currently running on the Berlin window display, airing four times an hour on weekdays between 6 a.m. and 10 a.m. and between 4 p.m. and 8 p.m., and will continue until October 26. Starting October 26, the ad will air again. Over the next two weeks, 400 A0 posters will be added in downtown Berlin, promoting the company's program with the slogan "Read faster, read better."

The campaign is part of a broader initiative to improve reading efficiency among adults. Improved Reading offers a training system that has been in use since 2001, with over 50,000 participants. The training focuses on techniques such as processing groups of words ("chunking"), reducing unnecessary backtracking in the text, and managing one's inner voice more consciously while reading. A key goal is to flexibly adjust reading speed to the text and reading goal.

A Berlin school project funded by the Erhard Hoepfner Foundation between 2003 and 2006 demonstrated the effectiveness of systematic reading training. A total of 272 students participated in 15 "Improved Reading" courses at ten Berlin schools. The evaluation, conducted by literary scholar Prof. Dr. Thomas Rathmann at the Technical University of Berlin, showed that average reading speed tripled over the course of the sessions, while reading comprehension also improved. Combined reading efficiency increased by a factor of 3.7 on average.

Another finding from the project was that weaker readers improved by a greater percentage than readers who were already above average. But even these readers achieved significant gains in speed and comprehension. For Hasse, this does not contradict the current focus on professional heavy readers.

In the age of artificial intelligence (AI), the ability to critically comprehend and contextualize texts remains crucial. AI applications can summarize long texts, search through them, and presort information. However, this does not render the ability to critically comprehend and contextualize texts obsolete.

The current PISA debate could provide an impetus to view reading literacy not merely as a school subject or as a problem specific to particularly weak readers.