A survey was conducted to determine how much and under what conditions students read voluntarily. Subjects, 844 secondary students, completed a questionnaire that was then analyzed using the Crosstabulation Subprogram of "Statistical Package for the Social Sciences" to correlate results with students' sex, grade level, scholastic achievement, and ethnicity. Among the results were the following: (1) newspapers were selected as the most important kind of voluntary reading by 67.5% of the students; (2) grade level is a significant factor in choice of topic (such as sports, comics, or news) in newspapers; and (3) novels were the favorite type of publication for voluntary reading, while newspapers were second in popularity. News and comics were cited as most frequently read sections of the paper, while only 18% of the subjects read editorials. Responses to the questions varied according to subjects' sex, grade level, scholastic achievement, and ethnicity. The clearest implication of this study is that newspapers offer the classroom teacher concerned about reading improvement a unique resource. (Eight tables of findings are included). (DF)