Several years after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the conversation in education is shifting. The focus is no longer only on how much learning students lost, but on what schools can do to support recovery.
This shift matters — it reorients us toward the important work of getting students and schools back on track, rather than just documenting the damage. Digging into the patterns and pathways of recovery is a critical first step toward understanding how schools are accelerating learning.
Using longitudinal test score data from more than 5 million students across over 9,000 schools, our recent analysis documents recovery rates and trajectories at the school level. We find recovery is happening, but it’s uneven — and schools are getting there in different ways.
Recovery is happening, but it’s not the norm
By fall 2024, about one in three schools had returned to pre-pandemic achievement levels in either math or reading, and roughly 1 in 7 had recovered in both subjects. This represents meaningful progress, especially given the scale of disruption. But it also means most schools are still working their way back.
Recovery rates are similar across subjects, though they reflect different dynamics. Schools experienced larger initial declines in math but also stronger post-pandemic gains, while reading declines were smaller but have proven more persistent.
There’s more than one way schools are recovering
It’s tempting to assume that schools recovered simply because they avoided the worst of the pandemic disruptions. On average, that’s partly true — schools that have recovered tended to experience smaller initial declines and stronger gains afterward.
But that’s not the whole story. About 1 in 5 recovered schools followed a different path: they experienced average or even large declines early on, then made remarkable gains in the years that followed, returning to prepandemic levels.
In practice, this might look like a middle school that saw sharp drops in math scores in 2021, then invested heavily in recovery interventions like high-dosage tutoring and summer school and saw accelerated gains, similar to some district success stories.
Taken together, these patterns suggest that recovery is not a single process. It reflects both how well schools limited early losses and how effectively they supported learning afterward.
The fastest progress is happening where it’s needed most
Schools serving higher-poverty communities, urban areas and historically marginalized students are less likely to have returned to pre-pandemic achievement levels. While they still have more ground to make up overall, these schools have made the largest gains since 2021.
This paints a more complicated picture than headlines often suggest. The schools furthest from recovery are often improving the fastest. These findings are consistent with evidence that federal investments in academic recovery allocated based on district poverty rates have bolstered student learning.
But the impressive gains in these schools have not yet been sufficient to offset their larger initial declines. As a result, despite this progress, achievement gaps between high- and low-poverty schools are still wider now than they were before the pandemic.
What this means for education leaders
These findings point to a few practical implications for state and district leaders.
- Look beyond averages.
National and state-level trends can mask important differences. States should make school-level recovery measures public and include information on recovery trajectories, such as initial declines and post-pandemic gains. This can help leaders distinguish between schools that resisted losses, those rebounding through accelerated growth, and those still lagging, enabling more informed decisions and opportunities to learn from schools showing strong recovery.
- Match strategies to recovery trajectories.
Schools are not all at the same stage of recovery. Some are still working to regain lost ground, while others are building on recent momentum. Tailoring supports to these different trajectories is likely to be more effective than one-size-fits-all approaches.
- Sustain momentum where growth is strongest.
Schools that were most affected by pandemic learning disruptions are making the largest gains. Maintaining that progress will be critical for long-term recovery and for narrowing persistent gaps.
- Plan for future disruptions.
The variation in recovery highlights the importance of both minimizing instructional disruption and responding quickly when it occurs. Schools that limited early losses may offer useful lessons for future crisis planning.
Recovery is underway, but it is neither complete nor evenly distributed. The next phase of this work will depend on how well education leaders recognize and respond to these differences — not just in where schools are today, but in how they are getting there. A clearer focus on recovery pathways in addition to outcomes can help ensure that recent progress continues and reaches the students who need it most.
Opinions expressed by SmartBrief contributors are their own.
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