COVID Lockdown Impact on Education: Analyzing Test Scores by State and Age

The COVID pandemic lockdowns gave rise to profound changes around the world. From remote jobs to mask mandates, the US had to find ways to combat the pandemic. One of these ways was to enact lockdowns where people had to stay home if they were not “non-essential workers” and remain at least 6 feet away in public spaces. Some states implemented longer lockdowns with stricter mask mandates while others had no rigid mandates or lockdowns. This led to the mass shift to remote learning in school around the US. This study examines the relationship between lockdown length in the different states and various standardized test scores including the NAEP (4th grade standardized test) ACT, and SAT. I hypothesized that test scores taken during and after the pandemic will be lower than those pre-pandemic. I also predicted that the longer the lockdown lasted, the lower the standardized test scores would be.