Pandemic recovery is uneven across Mass. school districts, per new study

Academic recovery after the pandemic is unfolding along two sharply different paths in Massachusetts. Students in wealthy school districts are nearing their 2019 performance, according to an annual report released Wednesday. At the same time, students in low-income districts remain far behind, especially in reading.

The national report, known as the Education Scorecard, analyzed reading and math scores for third through eighth graders in over 5,000 school districts across 38 states. Researchers from Harvard, Stanford and Dartmouth converted the results of state standardized tests — so for Massachusetts, think MCAS — onto a common national scale to compare academic performance and pandemic recovery over time.

The average Massachusetts student remains roughly half a grade level behind in reading and math when compared to pre-pandemic benchmarks. But the report shows students are experiencing vastly different rates of academic recovery depending on their district's economic status — noted in this report as the percentage of its students eligible for free or reduced-price lunches.

Students in high income districts are nearly back to where they were before the pandemic, said Thomas Kane, a Harvard professor who helped author the study. And in some cases they're ahead.

For example, Needham and Wellesley — where about 1 in 10 students are considered low income — are among districts who've surpassed their 2019 reading and math scores.

But the results are different in Lynn, Everett and Revere, where roughly three quarters of students are considered low income. Math and reading performance in these districts remains more than a full grade level below what it was before the pandemic.

"Many of the highest poverty districts remain far behind where they themselves were in 2019,” Kane said.

Massachusetts received roughly $2.86 billion in federal pandemic relief funding for K-12 schools. Those dollars were largely targeted to high poverty districts. Kane said the money was crucial in preventing even greater academic slide.

Now that the funding has dried up, he said, Massachusetts must double down on supporting low-income districts that remain behind.

Massachusetts is widely considered a national leader in K-12 education, consistently scoring at the top on the National Assessment of Education Progress, known as the Nation's Report Card. It's a standardized test administered all across the country every two years. The state's scores were highest in the nation in 2024, the most recently administered exam.

But like many other states, Massachusetts has seen a decline in reading scores. Before the pandemic, Massachusetts students were performing a full grade level above the national average in reading, according to the scorecard. In 2025, they were half a grade level above average.

“We call ourselves number one in education, but that's only true for some students."

Jennie Williamson, EdTrust

“Our reading scores are not moving in the right direction,” said Jennie Williamson, state director of EdTrust in Massachusetts, an advocacy group focused on education equity. “This is not really a pandemic story anymore. It's really a policy and instruction story.”

While most states saw gains in math between 2022 and 2025, few made progress in reading. Only seven states plus the District of Columbia saw average reading scores improve between 2022 and 2025. Massachusetts was not among them.

All states that made progress in reading have enacted phonics-based reading reforms.

The Massachusetts Legislature is now on the verge of passing a similar overhaul of reading instruction. The bill would require districts to explicitly teach students how to sound out words using phonics. The bill passed the House and the Senate unanimously and is now in conference committee.

There are some outliers among the data. Cambridge outperformed other Massachusetts districts with similar demographics in reading and math progress. And students in Salem, Weymouth and Duxbury grew a half a grade level or more in reading between 2022 and 2025.

Successes should be celebrated, Williamson said. But, she added, they shouldn't overshadow the districts that still lag behind.

“We call ourselves number one in education, but that's only true for some students,” she said.

Nearly every state in the report — Massachusetts included — saw declines in chronic absenteeism. A spokesperson for the state's Executive Office of Education pointed to that as a measure of progress but acknowledged more needs to be done to support academic progress.