I was 11 years old when Harry Potter broke loose. A year later, the Potter fad took America and my middle school by storm. A seventh grader, I thought I was too cool for Harry and his magical world. But eventually I caved, becoming enthralled with J.K. Rowling’s adventurous tales.

Nearly a decade later, I gathered with friends at Barnes and Noble as they waited to pick up the seventh and final Harry Potter book. It was a bizarre site, watching hundreds of adults and children -- some dressed up in Potter-like attire -- proceed through the store to pick up their books at midnight.

But despite the popularity of the Harry Potter series – Amazon.com pre-sold 2.2 million copies of the book and Borders sold about 1.2 million copies on day one – and the newly emerging young fans, childhood literacy is an increasing problem.

American 12th graders are currently performing worse in reading than 12th graders in 1992, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress. According to NAEP 2005 test results only about 35 percent of 12th graders are proficient in reading.

If you don’t think Harry Potter is high quality literature that ranks along side Great Expectations or Hamlet, you might want to think again. NAEP’s 2000 assessment of fourth-graders found that 87 percent of students who read for fun once a month or more, preformed at the proficient level, while students who never or hardly ever read for fun performed at the basic level.

Perhaps the Potter phenomenon has more worth than we think.

Sarah Karlin, ASBJ intern