IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp16531.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

COVID-19 and the European Education Performance Decline: A Focus on Primary School Children's Reading Achievement between 2016 and 2021

Author

Listed:
  • Schnepf, Sylke V.

    (European Commission, DG Joint Research Centre)

  • Granato, Silvia

    (European Commission, Joint Research Centre)

Abstract

This study uses the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) data, the only cross-national data having measured educational achievement during the COVID-19 pandemic, to investigate educational achievement decline of fourth graders across 21 European countries between 2016 and 2021. Learning decline estimated with PIRLS data is not only composed of learning loss due to COVID-19 but also European performance trends and national policy changes. The study illustrates the education performance decline in Europe by providing information on 20 year reading achievement trends, average performance declines and increasing number of the share of low performing students across European countries. Results of previous national counterfactual impact evaluation studies measuring learning decline in languages due to COVID-19 are compared to PIRLS reading achievement declines between 2016 and 2021. Furthermore, the study examines recent developments of educational inequalities within Europe by first comparing countries' education distributions between 2016 and 2021 and second by investigating changes in the share of children lacking important reading skills by socio-economic background.

Suggested Citation

  • Schnepf, Sylke V. & Granato, Silvia, 2023. "COVID-19 and the European Education Performance Decline: A Focus on Primary School Children's Reading Achievement between 2016 and 2021," IZA Discussion Papers 16531, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16531
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp16531.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Noam Angrist & Simeon Djankov & Pinelopi K. Goldberg & Harry A. Patrinos, 2021. "Measuring human capital using global learning data," Nature, Nature, vol. 592(7854), pages 403-408, April.
    2. Giorgina Brown & John Micklewright & Sylke V. Schnepf & Robert Waldmann, 2007. "International surveys of educational achievement: how robust are the findings?," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 170(3), pages 623-646, July.
    3. Brian Jacob & Jesse Rothstein, 2016. "The Measurement of Student Ability in Modern Assessment Systems," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 30(3), pages 85-108, Summer.
    4. Andreu Arenas & Lucas Gortazar, 2022. "Learning loss one year after school closures: Evidence from the Basque Country," Working Papers 2022/03, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bastian A. Betthäuser & Anders M. Bach-Mortensen & Per Engzell, 2023. "A systematic review and meta-analysis of the evidence on learning during the COVID-19 pandemic," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 7(3), pages 375-385, March.
    2. Schnepf, Sylke, 2018. "Insights into survey errors of large scale educational achievement surveys," Working Papers 2018-05, Joint Research Centre, European Commission.
    3. Erica Bosio & Simeon Djankov & Edward Glaeser & Andrei Shleifer, 2022. "Public Procurement in Law and Practice," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 112(4), pages 1091-1117, April.
    4. Singh, Abhijeet & Romero, Mauricio & Muralidharan, Karthik, 2024. "COVID-19 Learning loss and recovery," University of California at San Diego, Economics Working Paper Series qt3jj1b8hb, Department of Economics, UC San Diego.
    5. Yasser Razak Hussain & Pranab Mukhopadhyay, 2023. "How Much do Education, Experience, and Social Networks Impact Earnings in India? A Panel Data Analysis Disaggregated by Class, Gender, Caste and Religion," SAGE Open, , vol. 13(4), pages 21582440231, December.
    6. Aymo Brunetti & Konstantin Büchel & Martina Jakob & Ben Jann & Daniel Steffen, 2021. "Inadequate Teacher Content Knowledge and What to Do About It: Evidence from El Salvador," University of Bern Social Sciences Working Papers 41, University of Bern, Department of Social Sciences.
    7. Oscar Hernán Cerquera Losada & María de los Ángeles Clavijo Tovar & Carla Yanella Pérez Peña, 2022. "Capital humano y crecimiento económico: evidencia empírica para Suramérica," Apuntes del Cenes, Universidad Pedagógica y Tecnológica de Colombia, vol. 41(73), pages 143-167, February.
    8. Jakubowski, Maciej & Pokropek, Artur, 2015. "Reading achievement progress across countries," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 77-88.
    9. Eric Brunner & Joshua Hyman & Andrew Ju, 2020. "School Finance Reforms, Teachers' Unions, and the Allocation of School Resources," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 102(3), pages 473-489, July.
    10. Dickerson, Andy & Ratcliffe, Anita & Rohenkohl, Bertha & Van de Sijpe, Nicolas, 2024. "Anticipated labour market discrimination and educational achievement," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 222(C), pages 375-393.
    11. Jesse Rothstein, 2019. "Inequality of Educational Opportunity? Schools as Mediators of the Intergenerational Transmission of Income," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(S1), pages 85-123.
    12. Marco Francesconi & Holly Sutherland & Francesca Zantomio, 2011. "A comparison of earnings measures from longitudinal and cross‐sectional surveys: evidence from the UK," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 174(2), pages 297-326, April.
    13. Álvaro Choi & María Gil & Mauro Mediavilla & Javier Valbuena, 2018. "The Evolution of Educational Inequalities in Spain: Dynamic Evidence from Repeated Cross-Sections," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 138(3), pages 853-872, August.
    14. Rosa Sanchis-Guarner & José Montalbán & Felix Weinhardt, 2021. "Home Broadband and Human Capital Formation," CESifo Working Paper Series 8846, CESifo.
    15. Pritchett, Lant, 2024. "Investing in human capital in Africa: a framework for research," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 123655, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    16. Alessandra Bonfiglioli & Gino Gancia, 2019. "Heterogeneity, selection and labor market disparities," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 31, pages 305-325, January.
    17. Nik Ahmad Sufian Burhan & Mohamad Fazli Sabri & Heiner Rindermann, 2023. "Cognitive ability and economic growth: how much happiness is optimal?," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 70(1), pages 63-100, March.
    18. Chris Desmond & Kathryn Watt & Sara Naicker & Jere Behrman & Linda Richter, 2024. "Girls' schooling is important but insufficient to promote equality for boys and girls in childhood and across the life course," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 42(1), January.
    19. Mark Bailey & Vani Borooah, 2010. "What enhances mathematical ability? A cross-country analysis based on test scores of 15-year-olds," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(29), pages 3723-3733.
    20. Francisco H. G. Ferreira & Jérémie Gignoux, 2014. "The Measurement of Educational Inequality: Achievement and Opportunity," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 28(2), pages 210-246.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    COVID-19; pandemic; educational inequalities; school; PIRLS; Europe;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp16531. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.