Learning Loss: Time to Stop Blaming COVID

Student achievement began sinking decades ago. 

A thorough overhaul should replace reforms that didn’t work. - Eric Hanushek.

• But while educators rushed to address COVID learning losses, few Americans grasped that their children had already been falling behind for almost ten years. 

By 2019, before anyone had ever heard of Wuhan, N95 masks, or social distancing, eighth-grade math scores had already dropped to levels not seen since the early 2000s. 

And the declines continue...
The decline in scores has also been accompanied by a widening of the achievement distribution: 

lower-achieving students have suffered greater declines than those at the top of the achievement distribution...