WASHINGTON – Math and reading scores among America’s 13-year-olds fell to their lowest levels in decades, with math scores plunging by the largest margin ever recorded, according to the results of a test known as the nation’s report card.
The results, released Wednesday, are the latest measure of the deep learning setbacks incurred during the pandemic. While earlier testing revealed the magnitude of America’s learning loss, the latest test casts light on the persistence of those setbacks, dimming hopes of swift academic recovery.
More than two years after most students returned to in-person class, there are still ‘worrisome signs about student achievement,’ said Peggy G. Carr, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, a branch of the federal Education Department.
‘The ‘green shoots’ of academic recovery that we had hoped to see have not materialized,’ Carr said in a statement.
In the national sample of 13-year-old students, average math scores fell by 9 points between 2020 and 2023. Reading scores fell by 4 points. The test, formally called the National Assessment of Educational Progress, was administered from October to December last year to 8,700 students in each subject.
