Peter, I greatly appreciate you taking the time to write such a detailed, insightful, and penetrating response to my article and brief analysis of the state of modern writing. Alongside the specific issues you raise and the particular stats you provide, what I value most about your comment is the fact that is represents a different lens through which to think about, understand, and interpret problems with contemporary (American) writing (and English education more generally). You’re absolutely correct to (implicitly) point out that I’ve offered a “bottom-up” perspective on the issue, i.e., that the strategies I’ve outlined are rooted entirely in habits, techniques, and thinking patterns that individual people can apply as part of their unique and personal efforts to improve their writing skills. Conversely, you’ve offered more of a “top-down” interpretation, thinking about the state of modern writing from a structural, institutional, and systemic perspective. In this context, I wholeheartedly agree that the writing abilities of (America’s) young people and their command of the English language more broadly are unlikely to improve in the absence of meaningful social, cultural, and economic change pertaining to matters of edcuation, labour, and so on. It seems to me that my writing guide and your brief analysis of it indirectly reflect the essence of C. Wright Mills’ (1959) distinction between a) personal troubles of milieux and individual biography and b) public issues of social structure. Thank you for (inadvertently) reminding us all that the analytical frames/lenses through which we grasp and interpret a problem are just as important as the potential solution(s) we offer in response.