Beyond Test Scores: Broader Academic Consequences of the COVID-19 Pandemic on American Students. Report from a Consensus Panel

Recent state and national achievement exam results, as well as academic progress reports, have underscored how the COVID-19 pandemic and related school closures had a large, negative impact on students' reading and math development. While a great deal is known about the test-based academic impacts of the pandemic such as test scores that provide valuable evidence, there are a range of non-test measures like attendance, engagement in school, student retention, course failure rates, degree completion, and enrollment in subsequent levels of education that also yield important insights about students' educational well-being. These measures matter in their own right and in how they affect longer-term outcomes like employment, earnings, and adult well-being. This consensus panel report reviewed the best available evidence to understand how the pandemic affected non-tested academic areas, and it offers recommendations for shaping a policy response.