The average student needs the equivalent of 4.8 additional months of schooling to catch up in reading and 4.3 months in math¶
Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · associationalr?·q2
Currency · newest study 2024 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person · recheck by 2029: baselines and conditions change
Subclaims¶
Reading the evidence codes
q is the design tier, i the impact, n the sample, and the kind with its r
the rigour judged within that kind: what each code means.
This claim: no standardized effect is recorded in observations/ for it yet, so no benchmark reading is possible.
q2 i? The average student needs the equivalent of 4.8 additional months of schooling to catch up in reading and 4.3 months in math; the math estimate is similar to last year and the reading estimate is larger. → Karyn Lewis 2024
q2 i? The average student will need the equivalent of 4.8 additional months of schooling to catch up in reading and 4.3 months in math; estimates are similar to last year for math and larger for reading. → Karyn Lewis 2024
Evidence¶
Karyn Lewis 2024¶
Karyn Lewis, Megan Kuhfeld. (2024). Recovery still elusive: 2023-24 student achievement highlights persistent achievement gaps and a long road ahead. NWEA Research. https://www.nwea.org/research/publication/recovery-still-elusive-2023-24-student-achievement-highlights-persistent-achievement-gaps-and-a-long-road-ahead/
q2 · i? · associational · r?
The brief translates 2023-24 achievement gaps into required additional schooling, reporting "4.8 additional months of schooling to catch up in reading and 4.3 months in math" for the average student. These are descriptive estimates; no effect size or significance test is printed.
"The average student will need the equivalent of 4.8 additional months of schooling to catch up in reading and 4.3 months in math. These estimates are similar to last year for math, and larger for reading."
Discussion¶
Related Claims¶
- The average student needs an estimated 4.5 additional months of schooling to catch up in math — related
- The average student needs an estimated 4.1 additional months of schooling to catch up in reading — related
- The achievement divide between high and low achievers widened significantly over the last two years of the pandemic — related
- The gap between pre-COVID and COVID test score averages widened in 2023-24 in nearly all grades, by an average of 36% in reading and 18% in math — related
- Researchers have translated test scores into months of learning to claim how many months or years students are behind in school — a broader claim this one bears on
- Significant achievement gaps between COVID-year students and pre-pandemic peers persisted at the end of 2022-23 — related
- The 2022-23 school year showed stalled progress toward pandemic recovery in student achievement — related
Page metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
type |
claim |
id |
months-of-schooling-needed-to-catch-up-2023-24 |
aliases |
catch-up-requires-additional-months-reading-math |
title |
The average student needs the equivalent of 4.8 additional months of schooling to catch up in reading and 4.3 months in math |
description |
The average student needs the equivalent of 4.8 additional months of schooling to catch up in reading and 4.3 months in math |
status |
review |
evidence_strength |
moderate |
newest_evidence |
2024 |
recheck_by |
2029 |
generated |
by process:wiki-ingest on 2026-10-08 |
trust |
unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content |
sources |
1 — karyn-lewis-2024 |
Frontmatter is the page's machine-readable record — see the Schema & Guide.