Pandemic and Standardized Test: An Analysis of Test Participation in New York State

• In Event: District-Level Financial Decisions and Educational Outcomes

Abstract

As schools worldwide have resumed normal operations, the profound impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the education system has come into focus. Many researchers demonstrated the pandemic has had devastating damage to students’ learning outcomes, however, few studies argued the learning loss might be even larger given students and parents opted out of taking standardized tests during the pandemic. This study uses student data from 2019 to 2022 in New York state. Using a Bayesian estimation, the preliminary results show that schools with a higher proportion of White students tend to have a high test participation, compared with others; schools with a higher proportion of Free-and-Reduced lunch and special education students have much lower test participation.

Author

• Yaxin Wang, Arizona State University