These outcomes raise difficult questions about how to best respond to the needs of students and educators going forward. For example, how can curricula be adjusted to meet students where they are today, after nearly three years of pandemic-impacted learning? How can we best re-engage the larger proportion of students who may have become disconnected as a result of these pandemic-related disruptions to their education? What does this all mean for the future of the labor force?
In addition to the challenges facing primary and secondary education, higher education was not immune to pandemic disruptions. Like K-12 education, studies show that online instruction reduced the academic performance of college students.3 In addition, we have seen declines in both college enrollment and the rate of first-year college students who continue their education into a second year.4 These declines are most pronounced at community colleges and open-access programs. Some of this decline was due to a supply-induced shortage resulting from colleges unable to offer remote learning options for many technical and vocational programs. The reduction in these "hands-on" programs, such as air-conditioning repair and auto detailing, had a greater impact on male enrollment and may lead to labor supply shortages for some of these skills-based professions.5
Education is the greatest and most effective input into the future of our labor market. In order to have the strongest possible labor force in the future, it is critical to understand and act immediately to address the educational losses experienced during the pandemic. I'm sure there's much to learn about how these education challenges, both longstanding and more recent, will ultimately affect the job market. That's a question of particular interest to policymakers, and it's one of the most important reasons that we host events like this seminar. I look forward to hearing from the experts we have invited here today to discuss ideas to successfully and quickly address academic declines, expand K-12 education options, improve higher education outcomes, and prepare this generation to participate and thrive in the future labor force.
I hope that the research presented today is useful to you in your work. Community development professionals in our audience may consider how the design and implementation of their services can be enhanced. And researchers may encounter ideas that spark new work that can shed further light on these important topics. Thank you so much for joining us.
October 20, 2022
1. Bureau of Labor Statistics Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. Accessed via FRED. Return to text
2. National Center for Education Statistics, "More than 80 Percent of U.S. Public Schools Report Pandemic Has Negatively Impacted Student Behavior and Socio-Emotional Development," press release, July 6, 2022. Return to text
3. Michael S. Kofoed, Lucas Gebhart, Dallas Gilmore, and Ryan Moschitto, "Zooming to Class?: Experimental Evidence on College Students' Online Learning during COVID-19," Discussion Paper Series No. 14356 (Bonn, Germany: IZA Institute of Labor Economics, May 2021). Return to text
4. Persistence and Retention, Fall 2020 Beginning Postsecondary Student Cohort (PDF), Persistence and Retention Report Series (National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, June 2022). Return to text
5. Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach and Sarah Turner, "Limited Supply and Lagging Enrollment: Production Technologies and Enrollment Changes at Community Colleges during the Pandemic," NBER Working Paper 29639 (National Bureau of Economic Research, January 2022). Return to text
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