Linking COVID-19 Learning Modes to Achievement Results Using NAEP Data

• In Event: COVID-19 Experiences, Contexts, and Outcomes From The Nation’s Report Card

Abstract

In February through June of 2021, the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) collected information about mode of learning offered (i.e., full-time in person, full-time remote, or a hybrid of the two) and student enrollment by learning mode from a nationally representative sample of schools originally intended to be assessed in 2021. When the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) was postponed in 2021, NCES took advantage of this sample of schools to respond to the Executive Order on supporting the reopening and continuing operation of schools and early childhood education providers (United States, 2021).

In addition to reporting on the MSS variables, the 2021 MSS sample also enabled linking of school responses to the 2021 MSS variables to performance on the 2022 NAEP assessments in mathematics and reading at grades 4 and 8. To support the linking, the 2022 NAEP school sample was selected to maximize the overlap with the school sample from the 2021 MSS as well as to support operational state and national reporting (which requires about 12,000 schools). Approximately one third of the 2022 student NAEP sample in reading and mathematics attended schools that were sampled in the 2021 MSS and had sufficient responses to the MSS to warrant inclusion in the study.

The linking study examined how student performance in 2022 differed by schools’ responses to instruction or learning mode offered and enrollment in instruction modes. This paper presents an extension of the linking study in which bivariate relationships between student achievement and learning mode offered or enrollment are contextualized by controlling for additional covariates (e.g., National School Lunch Program (NSLP) eligibility; race/ethnicity; school location and parental education) using regression analyses.

References
- United States, Executive Office of the President [Joseph R. Biden Jr.]. (2021). Executive Order on Supporting the Reopening and Continuing Operation of Schools and Early Childhood Education Providers.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/01/21/executive-order-supporting-the-reopening-and-continuing-operation-of-schools-and-early-childhood-education-providers/

Authors

• Carol Eckerly, Educational Testing Service

• Robert Finnegan, Educational Testing Service