[hgial]

Everyone here seems to be certain the pandemic will have huge and lasting effects on educational outcomes for kids. I would instead bet that while there will be effects in the short term, these effects will mostly fade within a few years (preexisting gaps will remain, but they won't get much bigger).

This post reviews some of the existing evidence on the effect of missing school:

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/kids-can-recover-from-...

And generally finds that kids can catch up quite quickly.

I think my one caveat is that there may be a group of at-risk kids for whom school was keeping them from getting into serious trouble with the law. Those effects could conceivably be both large and lasting (e.g., if you carjack someone and kill them in the process and spend the next 15 years in prison it's going to have a big effect on your life!).

[JoeAltmaier]

I agree - primary school is an interesting exercise but maybe over-stressed.

Anecdata: my brother-in-law grew up in rural Oklahoma. "How were the schools?" "Oh, terrible. No AP courses; not a lot of math. I had to spend an extra year starting college, to be ready for regular college courses."

"So", I asked, "your entire primary education could be recapitulated in 1 year once you were 18? Why then do we put kids through all that?"

He had no answer. Of course, since he is a High School teacher, he didn't want to think that was true. But I wonder.