Fall 2020 Estimate: The COVID schools’ shutdown compounded the inevitable “summer slide”.
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In a prior post (originally published July 30, 2020 and re-posted last week), we provided background on students’ “summer slide” in learning … and presented some research projecting how much “dislearning” will have occurred since schools closed in Spring, 2020 until Fall, 2020.
At the time, the WSJ did a study that painted a dire picture: The Results Are In for Remote Learning: It Didn’t Work.
Preliminary research projects students nationwide will return to school in the fall with roughly 30% dis-learning in reading relative to a typical school year, and more than 50% in math.
Those were forecasts, so we asked the rhetorical question: Wouldn’t it be nice if we knew how much students’ actually regressed while schools have been closed?
And, we advised: To find out, give students a round of standardized tests at the start of the school year.
We predicted: Results would likely shock educators, parents and politicos alike.
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Well, a national testing service did just what we asked.
According to the WSJ …
Data from Renaissance Learning — a national testing program which is used widely by U.S. public schools to assess students’ progress — shows widespread performance declines at the start of 2020-2021 academic year, particularly in math.
