Building back better to avert a learning catastrophe: Estimating learning loss from COVID-19 school shutdowns in Africa and facilitating short-term and long-term learning recovery

We model learning losses due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the potential for cost-effective strategies to build back better. Data from Early Grade Reading Assessments in Ethiopia, Kenya, Liberia, Tanzania, and Uganda suggest half to over a year’s worth of learning loss. In modeling losses over time, we found that learning deficits for a child in grade 3 could lead to 2.8 years of lost learning by grade 10. While COVID-19 has stymied learning, bold, learning-focused reform consistent with the literature reviewed in this paper—specifically reform on targeted instruction and structured pedagogy—could improve learning even beyond pre-COVID-19 levels.     

School closures and effective in-person learning during COVID-19

We document large temporal and geographical discrepancies among prominent trackers that measure in-person, hybrid, and remote schooling in the U.S. during COVID-19. We then propose a new measure of effective in-person learning (EIPL) that combines information on schooling modes with cell phone data on school visits and estimate it for a large, representative sample of U.S. public and private schools. The EIPL measure, which we make publicly available, resolves the discrepancies across trackers and is more suitable for many quantitative questions. Consistent with other studies, we find that a school’s share of non-white students and pre-pandemic grades and size are associated with less in-person learning during the 2020–21 school year. Notably, we also find that EIPL was lower for schools in more affluent and educated localities with higher pre-pandemic spending and more emergency funding per student. These results are in large part accounted for by systematic regional differences, in particular political preferences.     

Using educational transitions to estimate learning loss due to COVID-19 school closures: The case of Complementary Basic Education in Ghana

Learning loss is expected for millions of children who have been out of school as a result of the current COVID-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, it is uncertain how much learning will be lost and how wide the gaps may be for disadvantaged children. This paper uses a unique longitudinal dataset to estimate learning loss during a three-month transition from Complementary Basic Education to government schools in Ghana. Our results show an average learning loss of 66 % of previous learning gains in foundational numeracy during this transition period. More importantly, we estimate widening gaps in learning loss according to lack of home learning support, as well as lack of home learning resources. Our results have implications for the provision of learning activities and support at home, not just during current school closures due to COVID-19, but also during transitions between academic years.     

An analysis of the reach and effectiveness of distance learning in India during school closures due to COVID-19

In India, more than 276 million children and youth were out of school for extended periods since March 2020 due to school closures in response to COVID-19. A key challenge has been how to measure the impact of responses to continuity of learning both to ensure more effective responses in the event of further disruptions, but also to help the education community conceptualize more creative and effective approaches to learning, through blended and flexible approaches. This study reflects on the findings from a UNICEF survey targeting parents and adolescents across 6 states in India, and identifies lessons learned for addressing learning inequities during future school closures. We focus on measuring three key variables – access to technology, their utilization, and perceived learning for different profiles of children. As students began learning from home, technology access rates in households were initially used to determine the estimated maximum reach of different distance learning modalities during school closures. Beyond access, we find significant variations in adolescents’ use of technology for learning purposes and their perceptions of learning, linked to the type of remote learning modality, gender, location and type of school. We discuss the implications for government strategies and policies to ensure better utilization of technologies which are available in households and to address equity gaps in learning opportunities.     

The Potential Impact of COVID-19 on Student Learning and How Schools Can Respond

There is no denying the impact that the coronravirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak has had on many aspects of our lives. This article looks at the potential impact of COVID-19 on student learning as schools abruptly morphed into virtual learning environments using data from several instructional, practice, and assessment solutions offered by Renaissance. First, three hypothetical learning scenarios are considered using normative data from Star assessments to explore the potential impact on reading and math test performace. Next, data on Focus Skills are used to highlight which grades may have missed the most foundational math and reading content if instruction was stopped or reduced. Last, data from two of Renaissance's practice tools are used to evaluate whether students were practicing key skills following school closures. The article concludes that academic decline will likely occur but may be tempered by the increased use of practice tools; effects may look different for math and reading; and may impact grades and schools differently. As such, schools may need to leverage decision-making frameworks, such as the Multi-tiered Systems of Support/Response-to-Intervention (MTSS/RTI) framework, more than ever to identify needs and target instruction where it matters most when school begins in fall 2020.     

The effect of school closures on standardised student test outcomes

The school closures owing to the 2020 COVID-19 crisis resulted in a significant disruption of education provision, leading to fears of learning losses and of an increase in educational inequality. This article evaluates the effects of school closures based on standardised tests in the last year of primary school in the Dutch-speaking Flemish region of Belgium. Using a 6-year panel, we find that students of the 2020 cohort experienced significant learning losses in three out of five tested subjects, with a decrease in school averages of mathematics scores of 0.17 standard deviations and Dutch scores (reading, writing, language) of 0.19 standard deviations as compared to previous cohorts. This finding holds when accounting for school characteristics, standardised tests in Grade 4 and school fixed effects. Given the large observed effect sizes, the effect of school closures appears to be a combination of lost learning progress and learning loss. Moreover, we observe that inequality both within schools and across schools rises by 7% for mathematics and 8% for Dutch. The learning losses are correlated with observed school characteristics, as schools with a more disadvantaged student population experience larger learning losses.     

Understanding effects of COVID-19 on undergraduate academic stress,motivation and coping over time

The rapid and unprecedented shift from face-to-face instruction to remote online learning as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic had a substantial impact on teaching and learning in Higher Education: students had to adapt to a new way of learning, away from typical campus settings and their peers, and to new forms of assessments. This study examined academic stress, learning strategies, motivation and ways of coping from a sample of 177 unique students from a large London university, collecting primary data via survey at three time points during the academic year 2020/21 when teaching was remote and online only. Our findings show how patterns in academic stress, learning strategies, motivation and coping vary over the course of the academic year giving novel insight into how student learning and adaptation to the situation changed over time. We also report on differences in these patterns according to year group and for those students who are the first-in-family to attend university and those who are not. Based on these findings we identify priority areas where higher education institutions should support undergraduate students and provide evidence that some groups of students may need more and targeted support to secure their ongoing learning and well-being.     

Modelling the long-run learning impact of the Covid-19 learning shock: Actions to (more than) mitigate loss

This paper uses a calibrated “pedagogical production function” model to estimate the potential long-term losses to children’s learning from the temporary shock of Covid-19 related school closures. It then models possible gains from two mitigation strategies. Without mitigation, children could lose more than a full year’s worth of learning from a three-month school closure because they will be behind the curriculum when they re-enter school and will fall further behind as time goes on. Remediation when children return to school reduces the long-term learning loss by half, but still leaves children more than half a year behind where they would have been with no shock. Remediation combined with long-term reorientation of curriculum to align with children’s learning levels fully mitigates the long-term learning loss due to the shock and surpasses the learning in the counterfactual of no shock by more than a full year’s worth of learning. Systems need to begin planning now for remediation programmes, and as they do so they should build programmes and train teachers in ways that can continue to produce benefits beyond the period immediately following reopening.     

The pathway to progress on SDG 4 requires the global education architecture to focus on foundational learning and to hold ourselves accountable for achieving it

Levels of reading comprehension and ability to do basic mathematics are shockingly low among primary-age children in low-income countries, despite the efforts of global education actors. This essay will argue that to make real progress on improving learning, actors in the sector need to prioritize a few key goals – in particular foundational literacy and numeracy – monitor progress to achieve them, and hold ourselves collectively accountable for improving results. Recent efforts such as the World Bank’s Foundational Learning Compact show promise but will require the support and scrutiny of other actors.     

Pressures and influences on school leaders navigating policy development during the COVID-19 pandemic

The pressures and influences experienced by school leaders as school policymakers, during the first responses to COVID-19 pandemic, made their task of interpreting, translating and implementing school guidance both difficult and stressful. During COVID-19 pandemic, school leaders faced challenges to prioritise and balance ever-changing government policy advice with the limitations of school buildings, the welfare of students and staff, and the needs of communities, a task made complicated by the methods of communication used by government. By surveying and interviewing headteachers, senior leaders and governors, this article identifies the reactions and responses of school leaders who construct and enact policy in the context of COVID-19 pandemic. The article addresses the nature of, and factors affecting, pressures school leaders feel in authoring and implementing policy. These pressures are non-trivial and increase tension in already highly stressful work. The report draws on data collected from a randomised, stratified sample of primary and secondary school leaders from across England in early June 2020, during the time of national lockdown and remote learning. Findings suggest quality, quantity and frequency of top-down communication contributed to school leader stress, while horizontal communication and collaboration between school leaders and across school communities supported leaders during rapid change. We recommend that government and the Department of Education strengthen and streamline stressful communication systems while building cooperative communities, mitigating against the challenges identified by school leaders during the COVID-19 pandemic.     

Reassessing school effectiveness: Multi-objective value-added measures (MOVAM) of academic and socioemotional learning

Under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), it is imperative that American public schools assess and improve not only academic but also non-academic measures of student learning such as socioemotional skills. The policy shift towards broad-based school accountability calls for reassessing school effectiveness from whole child development perspectives and addressing potential biases and limitations of conventional value-added measures (VAM). Through multivariate multilevel analyses of the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kintergarten (ECLS-K): 2011 data, this study applies multi-objective value-added measures (MOVAM) approach to assess and improve school effectiveness for academic and socioemotional learning. The study results show different patterns of academic vs. socioemotional learning gains, and also weak correlations between school effects on the two types of learning outcomes. Nevertheless, the comparisons of academically and socioemotionally effective vs. ineffective schools imply that schools can and should improve both academic and socioemotional learning outcomes through synergistic improvement of key organizational and instructional conditions.     

疫情下高校线上教学状况调查:以辽宁省为例

以疫情期间接受线上教学的辽宁省高校大学生1262个样本为研究对象,通过网络问卷来调查疫情下高校学生大规模线上学习状况,分析出影响学生线上学习效果的因素是网络与教学平台、学生自主学习态度与能力、教师在线技术与能力等。基于此提出线上教学质量提高的建议。     

疫情下高校毕业生的学习与就业状况研究

2020年春季学期是高校毕业生学习、求职与深造的关键时期,新冠肺炎疫情影响全球经济和社会生活,也对高校毕业生的职业生涯发展产生冲击。基于江苏省9535份问卷数据发现,在学业方面,毕业生对最后一个学期尚有多元化学习期待,由于疫情影响,他们大多只能居家学习,毕业论文/设计完成进度不理想,普遍担忧能否如期毕业。面临深造还是求...     

Coping with distance learning during COVID-19 and its impact on students' emotional experiences: Differences between students with and without special education needs

Given the almost 2-year COVID-19 school-related closure in Mexico, children and adolescents have experienced a negative impact not only on their learning, but as well as on their mental health and well-being. Although international research has shown that distant learning as a response to the COVID-19 school-related closures has severely affected students with special education needs, there is still a lack of studies conducted in Mexico. Thus, this study attempts to tackle this gap by exploring how Mexican students with and without special education needs coped with distance learning as well as its impact on their emotional experiences. A total of 293 Mexican lower secondary students participated in the study. Independent sample t-tests indicated that, in comparison with students without special needs, students with special needs coped significantly worse during distance learning as well as had higher levels of negative activation. Additionally, multiple linear regression analyses revealed that students' self-efficacy functioned as an important coping mechanism. Implications of the results, as well as further lines of research are discussed.     

终身收入视角下学前教育中断的经济后果——基于疫情下“学习趋势”框架的全球估算

新冠疫情不仅是一场全球公共卫生危机,还广泛地产生经济和社会影响。依据“学习趋势”框架,选取联合国教科文组织新冠疫情应对小组、联合国教科文组织教育统计处、世界银行教育统计数据库中共170个国家与经济体的数据,构建终身收入视角下学前教育中断的中长期经济后果测算模型。结果显示,截至2021年10月31日全球学前教育中断实质造成相当约0.38个正常学年学习增量的直接损失,其对应人均终身收入损失约8.5万美元（2017PPP）,相当于成年后预期年均收入下降3.05%。在全球层面,中长期经济损失累计约21.1万亿美元（2017PPP）,其中欧亚大陆国家所承担的中长期经济代价将达全球损失一半以上。新冠疫情下,全球学前教育中断的影响是普遍且深远的,任何一个国家和区域都无法独善其身,各国应团结正视教育系统所面临的严重挑战,以实际行动恢复优质且连续的学前教育。     

Adolescents' daily sense of school connectedness and academic engagement: Intensive longitudinal mediation study of student differences by remote,hybrid, and in-person learning modality

In spring 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic thrust nearly 56 million students in the United States into remote education. By fall 2020, states' and school districts' differing public health measures resulted in the adoption of varying COVID-adapted learning modalities (i.e., in-person, remote, and hybrid). Using daily diary data with a nationally representative sample (N = 517, M_age = 14.65 years), we investigated whether adolescents' academic engagement and connectedness to their teachers and classmates differed by COVID-adapted learning modalities. We also assessed whether adolescent connectedness mediated the link between learning modality and academic engagement. Results revealed that academic engagement and connectedness to teachers and classmates were higher for in-person learners than for students in hybrid and remote learning modalities. Moreover, students’ connectedness to classmates and teachers explained the relationship between learning modality and academic engagement.     

新冠疫情背景下高职学生学习状况分析及应对策略--以浙江省4所高职院校大学生为例

对浙江省4所高职院校2254名学生进行调查分析,得知当前新冠肺炎疫情下高职学生学习自主性得以强化,对学校居家学习安排认可度较高,普遍认同居家学习能确保学习效率,但依然存在学生学习指导、投入和专注性弱化,学习环境和自主学习力不佳等问题,部分学生担忧网络学习效果,多数学生不期望调整周末或压缩假期。对此,教育主管部门要做好统筹规划,高校要强化教学技术支撑和学科协同,辅导员要深化网络思想政治教育,学生要细化学习目标、启发自我导向性学习、培养学习毅力与专注力。