Despite irregularities in the management of Reading First…. majority of states credit the program with improving reading instruction, according to a report by the Government Accountability Office…. According to the report, 69 percent of those surveyed praised the program for “great or very great improvement in reading instruction.” About 80 percent said the program had vastly improved teacher training…. The report also found that most states were satisfied with the help they had received from federal officials and private contractors in applying for grants.

But the accountability office… found that department officials and private contractors might have broken the law in either steering 14 states toward specific reading programs or advising them not to use others. Those states were not identified….

Previous audits of the program, and some local school officials, said the department had used the law to promote reading programs with a heavy reliance on phonics, which focuses on the mechanics of sounding out syllables, rather than methods emphasizing additional strategies for making sense of texts. The House and the Senate are planning hearings…. The G.A.O. report incorporated recommendations from the earlier inspector general reports that the Education Department should guard against conflicts of interest in administering the program.

In a response attached to the report, the deputy secretary of education, Raymond Simon, wrote that the department agreed with its recommendations. (Education Secretary Margaret Spellings declined to comment.)

Diana Jean Schemo, New York Times, March 25.