National test results may finally answer the question of how COVID-19 impacted education

Utah – This month, fourth and eighth-grade students across Utah have been taking a national test.

Their scores may finally answer the question of how COVID-19 impacted their education.

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is the largest national assessment of what U.S. students know and can do in math and reading.

It’s congressionally mandated and administered by the National Center for Education, under the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences.

In this year’s test cycle, approximately 200 schools and over 9,000 students participated in Utah.

“This year’s NAEP assessment is the first ‘post-pandemic’ results that we will have at the state and national level,” says Angela Battaglia, Utah’s NAEP State Coordinator.

Test results will be compiled in the “Nation’s Report Card,” a summary of the state of U.S. education.

The last nationwide NAEP test to be fully completed was in 2019.

According to Peggy Carr, the commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, after two years of COVID-19 restrictions leading to nationwide school shut-downs and learning remotely, “the likelihood that the scores would be anything but down is pretty small”.