Oftentimes, the root cause of the critical reading problem is the quality of the writing that students are subjected to. My daughter recently showed me one of her economics readings, and said she couldn't understand it. It was 40 pages of convoluted academic writing like this:
Wibbels argues that developing countries face an inherently disadvantaged position in the world economy due to their dependence on foreign capital and an undiversified base of commodity exports as primary sources of hard currency. This dependent position relative to capital markets prevents developing countries from borrowing to engage in counter-cyclical aggregate demand management.
Is such language the optimal way to express ideas for comprehension by peers, students, and policymakers?
I hope your mission to improve writing skills in higher ed addresses the source of output - professors, teaching assistants, journal editors, and others who continue to promote outdated, inconsistent, and counterproductive academic writing styles.