Academic progress has taken a wrong turn since the pandemic. Students are falling further behind as schools prepare to face the impending loss of COVID-19 relief funding, which was intended to help them recover from major setbacks in math and reading.
According to new research published Tuesday, eighth graders have fallen a full year behind in math and reading more than four years since the pandemic started. The report states that the average US student needs more than four months of school to return to pre-pandemic levels of achievement.
The NWEA’s report says, “Growth has slowed to lag pre-pandemic rates, resulting in achievement gaps that continue to widen, and in some cases, now surpass what we had previously deemed as the low point.” The analysis examines the current test score data from third to eighth-grade students in 22,400 public schools nationwide.
The research revealed that marginalized students remain the most likely to fall behind. Students did not make much progress during the previous school year or before. Some reports also show that schools were failing to assist third—and fourth-grade students in catching up to their pre-pandemic reading and math levels. Schools were also challenged partly by absenteeism, student behavior setbacks, and increased staff departures and absences.
At the beginning of the 2022-2023 school year, Miguel Cardona, the US Education Secretary, stated that the pandemic-related academic setbacks highlighted in the federal Nation’s Report Card were not acceptable. The test scores disclosed dramatic declines in math and reading scores among the nation’s fourth and eighth graders, revealing how the pandemic-related disruptions interrupted learning for American studies.
Cardona urged schools at the time to use the billions of funds made available under the Biden administration’s American Rescue Plan to offset the loss in Academic progress.
The Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund monies will expire at the end of September. Districts must commit their funds by the deadline.
According to Marguerita Roza and Katherine Silberstein, less federal funding will be available to boost student achievement in the coming years as the skill gap persists.
Roza and Silberstein wrote, “While amounts vary across districts, on average, that equates to a single-year reduction in spending of over $1,000 per student.”
