The authors surveyed American School District Panel member districts about what interventions they used during the 2023–2024 school year to assist with students' learning recovery from coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic–related setbacks. Districts were also asked about their expected revenues in future school years and whether they plan to make cuts because of the expiration of federal stimulus funds.

Districts' Pandemic Recovery Efforts as COVID-Relief Aid Expires

Selected Findings from the Spring 2024 American School District Panel Survey

Melissa Kay Diliberti, Heather L. Schwartz

ResearchPublished Jul 30, 2024

In spring 2024, the authors surveyed 190 American School District Panel member districts about what interventions (e.g., tutoring, additional staff, additional instruction time) they were still using during the 2023–2024 school year to assist with students' learning recovery from coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic–related setbacks. Districts were also asked about their expected revenues in future school years and what cuts, if any, they plan to make because of the expiration of federal stimulus funds. This series is intended to provide brief analyses of educator survey results of immediate interest to policymakers, practitioners, and researchers.

Key Findings

  • In the 2023–2024 school year, a majority of districts nationally took a diversity of approaches (e.g., social and emotional learning instruction, in-person tutoring, credit recovery) to help students recover academically from COVID-19 pandemic–related setbacks.
  • Eighty-three percent of districts added staff in the 2023–2024 school year to assist with academic recovery.
  • Nationally, a quarter of districts anticipated revenue drops in the 2024–2025 and 2025–2026 school years. Four in ten high-poverty districts anticipated cuts in the 2025–2026 school year after the expiration of COVID-19 federal aid.
  • Reducing teachers was the most common budget cut that districts anticipated.
  • Districts do not plan to cut back on devices: Virtually all surveyed districts (97 percent) planned to continue providing computing devices for students into the 2024–2025 school year.

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Diliberti, Melissa Kay and Heather L. Schwartz, Districts' Pandemic Recovery Efforts as COVID-Relief Aid Expires: Selected Findings from the Spring 2024 American School District Panel Survey, RAND Corporation, RR-A956-23, 2024. As of October 8, 2024: https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA956-23.html
Chicago Manual of Style
Diliberti, Melissa Kay and Heather L. Schwartz, Districts' Pandemic Recovery Efforts as COVID-Relief Aid Expires: Selected Findings from the Spring 2024 American School District Panel Survey. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2024. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA956-23.html.
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This research was sponsored by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and conducted by RAND Education and Labor.

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