{"id":1711120,"date":"2022-10-26T06:09:05","date_gmt":"2022-10-26T10:09:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1711120"},"modified":"2022-10-26T06:48:35","modified_gmt":"2022-10-26T10:48:35","slug":"u-s-chamber-of-commerce-warns-of-long-term-economic-losses-from-plunging-child-test-scores","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/u-s-chamber-of-commerce-warns-of-long-term-economic-losses-from-plunging-child-test-scores\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Chamber of Commerce Warns of Long-Term Economic Losses From Plunging Child Test Scores"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fu-s-chamber-of-commerce-warns-of-long-term-economic-losses-from-plunging-child-test-scores%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1711120&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The U.S. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-chamber-of-commerce\">Chamber of Commerce<\/a> signaled the alarm after the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) recently revealed the grim performance of fourth- and eighth-grade American <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-students\">students<\/a> in math and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-reading\">reading<\/a> as test scores declined in the single largest drop since record keeping began in 1992.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a wakeup call for our country\u2014for policymakers, leaders in public <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-education\">education<\/a>, and the business community,\u201d said Cheryl Oldham, U.S. Chamber of Commerce vice president of education policy. \u201cThese results show that learning loss has risen to historic levels in part due to the impact of the pandemic, which only exacerbated existing failures in the education system.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEven before the pandemic, NAEP results were showing students making little to no progress in reading and math after seeing steady increases for two decades.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Eighth-grade math performance dropped eight points since 2019, and about a third of students in both grades can\u2019t read at the minimum required level, according to the NAEP report. The decline has affected nearly every single state.<\/p>\n<p>While reading levels went down to 1992 levels, almost four in 10 eighth-graders failed to grasp basic math concepts. Eighth grade is \u201cpivotal\u201d in a student\u2019s math education as a failure here \u201ccould alter the trajectories and life opportunities of a whole cohort of young people, potentially reducing their abilities to pursue rewarding and productive careers in mathematics, science, and technology,\u201d said Daniel J. McGrath, acting associate commissioner for assessment for the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES).<\/p>\n<p>Oldham said that the solution \u201crequires more than just money,\u201d and that the data pointed to \u201clong-term economic losses\u201d for the country. She called for a renewed focus on the education system in order to prepare students \u201cto lead the jobs of the future.\u201d According to the organization, it is working toward \u201cimproving how testing data is used for school improvement and accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>Impact of Prolonged Lockdown Restrictions<\/h2>\n<p>NCES Commissioner Peggy G. Carr talked about the \u201cprofound toll\u201d of the pandemic, while Julia Rafal-Baer, a K-12 education expert who serves on the National Assessment Governing Board, said that \u201cCOVID was exceptionally disruptive, and we\u2019re running out of time to ensure that kids can indeed recover from this level of unfinished learning,\u201d according to the74Million website.<\/p>\n<p>Federal officials, such as Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona, have not directly pointed at the COVID-era restrictions imposed on students like stay-at-home orders and virtual learning mandates to be directly responsible for the drop in test scores.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf this is not a wake-up call for us to double down our efforts and improve education, even before it was\u2014before the pandemic\u2014then I don\u2019t know what will,\u201d Cardona <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2022\/10\/24\/us\/student-test-scores-nations-report-card\">told CNN<\/a> on Monday.<\/p>\n<p>Teachers\u2019 unions, including the American Federation of Teachers, advocated for extended school closures and virtual learning, which have had negative impacts on children, including a spike in child suicide attempts.<\/p>\n<h2>Reasons Beyond COVID?<\/h2>\n<p>However, looking back to pre-pandemic 2019, average reading scores for students at both grades four and eight were lower compared to 2017. As for math scores, fourth-grade performances were higher in nine states and lower in three; and for eighth grade, six states performed worse and three better, underlining a clear downward trend.<\/p>\n<p>Some social commentators are pointing to other issues at hand that could be affecting children\u2019s school performances like school choice.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe latest NAEP scores are a [red flag] and proof that parents need more options than public school instruction,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/KevinRobertsTX\/status\/1584909089230012416\">said<\/a> Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation. \u201cIt\u2019s not enough to say, \u2018I want every dollar to follow every student.\u2019 We need to declare: \u2018Parents should be in charge of what\u2019s going on in their kids lives. Full stop.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Politics is turning into a major factor in school education as fractious issues such as critical race theory (CRT) and gender discussion have become serious areas of contention between parents and teachers, and have also been blamed for the fall in standards.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cParents throughout the state are rising up against the sickening sex and gender theory teachings that are being forced on our kids in school,\u201d wrote Tudor Dixon, a Republican gubernatorial candidate in Michigan on <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TudorDixon\/status\/1584667058955988992\">Twitter<\/a>. \u201cWe need to stop the nonsense and get our kids back to the basics of reading, writing, and math in schools.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Lower expectations and a shift from math and reading toward \u00a0CRT does not fare well toward creating literate graduates.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPublic records and other evidence show that state-level and some local education officials are no longer focused on maintaining high academic standards and providing the best public education possible to students,\u201d Liv Finne, director of the Center for Education at Washington Policy Center, wrote in her September 2021 report (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpolicy.org\/library\/doclib\/Finne-WA-public-school-officials-lower-academic-standards-as-they-implement-CRT-program.pdf\">pdf<\/a>) regarding the lowering of academic standards by school officials in Washington State as they implement CRT.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cInstead, a concern for learning has been replaced by an aggressive political agenda designed to instill doubt, mental pain, and low expectations in students. This race-centered agenda also seeks to divide children from teachers, their own communities, and from each other.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis harmful trend can only be resolved through policies that return high-quality academic standards to public education and well-funded and supportive education-choice programs that allow families to access alternatives services to meet the learning needs of all children.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"author_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"one_author_block round\">\n<div class=\"top_row\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/author-naveen-athrappully\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/NaveenAthrappully.jpg\" alt=\"Naveen Athrappully\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Follow<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Naveen Athrappully is a news reporter covering business and world events at The Epoch Times.\n<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The U.S. Chamber of Commerce signaled the alarm after the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) recently revealed the grim performance of fourth- and eighth-grade American students in math and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1695609,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[547],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1711120","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bongino-report"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1711120","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1711120"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1711120\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1695609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1711120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1711120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1711120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}