Persistent and Gender-Unequal Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Student Outcomes in Italy

Leonard Moulin and Mara Soncin

No 277, Working Papers from French Institute for Demographic Studies

Abstract: The learning loss caused by the COVID-19 pandemic on students’ outcomes is likely to have lasting effects on which evidence is lacking. Using a differencein-differences design through 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 COVID-19 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, despite a statistically significant recovery compared to the previous school year. Our analysis highlights the pandemic’s disproportionate impact on girls, leading to a decrease in their academic performance and an intensification of gender-based inequalities (with the exception of grade 8 reading). Our results also show that the pandemic had a greater adverse impact on the academic achievement of students who experienced more prolonged classroom closures.

Keywords: COVID-19; learning loss; school closure; gender differences; Italy; POPULATION SCOLAIRE / SCHOOL POPULATION; EPIDEMIE / EPIDEMICS; SCOLARITE / SCHOOLING; ITALIE / ITALY; DIFFERENCE ENTRE SEXES / SEX DIFFERENTIALS (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 27
Date: 2023
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eur, nep-gen and nep-ure
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DOI: 10.48756/ined-dt-277.1023

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