Persistent impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on student outcomes in Italy

The learning loss caused by the COVID-19 pandemic on students’ outcomes is likely to have lasting effects, for which empirical evidence remains scarce.. Using a difference-in-differences design augmented by a triple difference estimator, we identify the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on Italian students’ test scores in the two years following the outbreak. Our findings indicate a persistently negative effect on mathematics and reading scores for grade 5 and grade 8 students in 2021–22, two years after the pandemic began. The magnitude compared the cohort that attended the same grades the year before (2020–21) varies by subject and grade. Our analysis highlights the pandemic’s heterogeneous impact, especially in terms of geographical differences that have been exacerbated by the emergency.