Georgia State Gets $1.85M to Study Remote Instruction and Recovery Impacts on K-12 Outcomes

ATLANTA — The U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences has awarded Georgia State University’s Georgia Policy Labs (GPL) $1.85 million to study the effects of remote instructional delivery and recovery strategies on student outcomes in grades K–12.

“The COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath provide an unprecedented opportunity to study the impact and effects of school closures and remote learning on students,” said Distinguished University Professor Tim Sass, principal investigator for the study. “The combination of family disruptions, closures of schools and rapid transition to remote learning resulting from the pandemic substantially reduced achievement growth for many students, particularly those experiencing vulnerabilities.”

What is not known is why some students fared better than others in remote learning environments and how the various recovery strategies implemented by school districts may have impacted student outcomes. This project will use surveys and rich longitudinal data to examine the factors associated with higher achievement growth in remote instruction and the relationship between specific recovery efforts and multiple student outcomes.

Joining Sass as co-principal investigators are K. Jurée Capers, an associate professor of public management and policy in the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies; Jennifer Darling-Aduana, an assistant professor of learning technologies in the Department of Learning Sciences in Georgia State’s College of Education & Human Development; and GPL Director of Research Thomas Goldring. Sass is faculty director of the Metro Atlanta Policy Lab for Education (MAPLE), which partners with Atlanta-area school districts and other stakeholders to evaluate the effectiveness of existing education programs and policies, design and test creative policy solutions, and boost their capacity to interpret the evidence.

The researchers expect their findings will provide short-run benefits to education agencies working to accelerate student learning and important insights to guide future research and practice as remote learning becomes a more important element in the post-pandemic educational landscape.

They will produce policy briefs and rapid-response presentations of their research findings for district and state leaders as well as longer research reports for district research staff, state agencies and nonprofit educational organizations that want a more in-depth analysis. All policy briefs, presentations and reports will be made available to the public.

GPL is conducting the study as a member of the national Research on Education Strategies to Advance Recovery and Turnaround (RESTART) Network, a collection of five research teams that are identifying and disseminating evidence-based strategies aligned with the needs of policymakers, leaders and educators who are serving and supporting accelerated post-pandemic recovery efforts in K–12 education.

NOTE: This project is fully supported by an award (R305A230400) totaling $1,849,956.00 through the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences.

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