(PJ Media) In 2022, states received $189 billion in funding for primary and secondary schools. The funding was supposed to go to programs that would allow kids to make up for the lost learning they were forced to experience during the pandemic.
Standardized test scores had fallen to levels not seen in forty years or more. The infusion of cash would, as the Biden administration promised, help kids catch up.
The most closely watched standardized test for primary and secondary school children is the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). It’s called “The Nation’s Report Card” because more students take this test than any other standardized test.
Nearly $200 billion spent to help kids catch up to pre-pandemic levels of competency in reading and math has been wasted. That’s the conclusion we can reach by looking at this year’s NAEP results.
“The percentage of eighth graders who have ‘below basic’ reading skills according to NAEP was the largest it has been in the exam’s three-decade history — 33 percent,” reports the New York Times. “The percentage of fourth graders at “below basic” was the largest in 20 years, at 40 percent.” (Read More)
