Reading and math scores have been sliding across the West for years, and the case is building that screens in the classroom are a big reason — bad news for schools that went all-in on digital tools.

• Test scores in most US states have fallen for a generation, and the same pattern shows up in over 90 countries: scores drop once schools make screens central to teaching.
• COVID pushed every classroom online, and nobody pulled it back afterward.
• Memory depends partly on where words sit on a page, so a book beats a screen — text that scrolls has no fixed place, and most people start skimming after a few minutes.
• East Asian countries let kids game and scroll at home but kept school itself analog, and they stayed on top in reading, math, and science.
• Ed tech was never regulated the way other products are, and most school software has no evidence behind it at all.

Outlook: Expect more parent groups and school boards to push for phone-free, paper-based classrooms while colleges scramble to handle students using AI to do entire courses for them.