of dollars were funneled to school districts across the United States
to help them make up for learning loss from the pandemic. But new
research shows that even with that extra money, school districts
are still struggling to close the gaps in reading, writing and math
that grew during the pandemic. Stephanie site has more on these findings
and where we go from here. Now. This research analyzed data from
more than 6.5 million public school students in third through eighth
grades, comparing their academic gains from 2022 to 2023 with pre
pandemic years. The study authors estimate that most students would
need on average, an additional 4.5 months of math instruction and
four months of reading instruction to catch up. I'm joined now by
Karen Lewis, director of the Center for School and Student Progress
and a lead researcher at NW E A. The organization that came out with
this new study. Karen, thank you so much for joining the news hour.
We know from previous, even recent research that public schools are
having a tough time closing that learning gap that occurred during
the pandemic. How does your study add to what we already know?
I think what's new about what we've learned in this most recent release
of data is that up Until this point, we had seen some positive signs
that we were starting to have some progress towards recovery, albeit
modest progress, So it's disheartening and disappointing that at
the end of the 22 23 school year, we actually have back slid slightly,
and the gaps between current achievement levels relative to pre pandemic
trends actually widened, and that's because students were making
gains this year at below average rates. Hmm. One of the startling
statistics in your analysis is you say the average eighth grader
needs more than nine months to catch up in math. That's a whole academic
year. So what should schools be doing that they haven't been to make
this happen? I don't think it's necessarily that schools need to
be doing things they haven't been. They just need to be doing more
of what they are doing. What we're seeing here are levels of unfinished
learning that will take many years to recoup. This isn't a strategy
where we have one single silver bullet That's going to get us out
of this mess, and it's going to be a matter of layering interventions
that are evidence base and being able to provide those on a longer
timeframe. What kind of interventions are we talking about? And have
those interventions been affected by the staffing shortages at schools
that we have been reporting on since the pandemic? The interventions
all share in common that they're trying to add back in some of that
instruction that was lost during the initial phase of the pandemic
when school shut down. So these are strategies like summer school
or double dozing core instruction in reading and math. We also know
that high dosage tutoring is a popular intervention that's happening
right now, and all of those strategies rely on humans to deliver
them. So you're right that staffing shortages really impede our ability
to deliver these at scale. We also know about anyone, so single intervention
is not going to be enough to get kids where we want them to be. It's
a matter of layering these and coming up with a suite of resources
to support kids. You know, reading through your policy recommendations
you do use this phrase high dosage tutoring. How do you scale that?
I mean, are there any innovations or ideas for how to do that, given
that so many students need this extra help? I think it's time to
get really creative about how we're finding access to tutors. And
it's not just putting out a help wanted ad but really getting creative
and going and seeking out members of the community that maybe, uh,
under looked and their ability to help support these efforts So using
high school students to connect with elementary school students using
college students to connect with high school students and so forth.
I think we need to think more broadly and more creatively about how
to source those positions. You know, Some are saying that the federal
government they're pointing out that the federal government government
put billions of dollars to help schools recover from the pandemic,
and that part of that focus was to get students back up to speed
to pre pandemic achievement. Some accountability lie with how school
districts spent that money in your view. In my view, it's too soon
to really see those efforts pay off. We know schools how to really
challenging year and 21 22 and 22 23 was still complete with challenges
in terms of staffing and chronic absentee levels. It's not as if
schools are doing the wrong things. They're just not doing enough
of the right things, and I think we need to have some empathy for
what it's like on the ground districts are not set up to be a nimble
and on the turn of a dime, be able to implement a high dosage tutoring
program to thousands of students just isn't the way schooling works.
I think what Our data suggest is that schools are doing the right
things, but just not enough of them. And it's going to need to extend
for a longer time frame. And so it certainly is not the time to withdraw
federal supports. If anything, it's time to double down and make
sure that we are supporting schools so that they can sustain and
ramp up these efforts in the coming years. You know, I was looking
at a report about how globally students around the world have fallen
behind in the U. S. Is actually not as bad as other countries. And
one question I have is whether the goal posts have moved for everyone
or need to move. Is it realistic at this point for educators and
parents to expect that their Children will catch up? To the achievement
that we were seeing pre pandemic. That's a question that I get a
lot. Why do we continue to compare current achievement levels to
pre pandemic trend? Should we just accept that this is our new normal?
I don't accept that. This is our new normal. I hope others don't
because if we do that, we just shrug our shoulders and accept that
kids are this much farther behind than they used to be. That's problematic
for the average kid. But it's catastrophic for the kids that have
been hardest hit, which are students in high poverty areas, black
and Hispanic students who are fully months and months behind where
we would want them to be, and that would only catch them up to pre
covid level. As of inequality, and I don't think we can just shrug
our shoulders and accept that this is how things are. Okay. I can't
give up on this. Karen Lewis. Thank you. So much for sharing these
insights with us. Thank you for having me.