Results from tests have revealed that the reading and math achievement levels of American children aged nine have declined to levels not seen in the country for two decades, highlighting the damage that the COVID-19 pandemic has caused to education in the United States. The National Center for Educational Statistics focused on the disparities between assessment results conducted in 2020, shortly before the declaration of COVID-19 as a global pandemic, and those conducted in early 2022 to measure the impact of learning disruptions associated with the pandemic on children's achievement levels.
Recently, the low test scores represented "some of the largest declines" in results since the center began regularly tracking student performance in reading and math in the 1970s, according to acting commissioner Daniel McGrath. In math, scores for Black students dropped by 13 points compared to an eight-point decline for Latinx students and a five-point decline for White students, reflecting a broader picture of minorities suffering disproportionately from the pandemic's repercussions. Reading scores also declined equally by six points across all racial groups from 2020 to 2022.
The study also surveyed students about how the pandemic affected their learning environment, with 70 percent of survey participants stating that their memory still retains experiences of remote learning at some point during the 2020-2021 school year.
