More community college students are enrolling without the requisite reading skills to be successful. Deaf and hard of hearing
(DHH) students are following a similar pattern with a little less than half requiring remedial instruction when entering college.
College-age readers were the first population that we studied to learn about reading and reading instruction. The present
study revisits this notion with DHH students at the forefront. We wanted to know what skills DHH readers have when they
enroll in community college and what skills secondary teachers could focus on to prepare them. Based on the Degrees of
Reading Power assessment given to DHH first year students prior entering community college (N = 409 participants), DHH
readers would benefit from instruction in three important areas of reading comprehension: key ideas and