While students saw across-the-board gains in the 2021-2022 school year compared to the previous academic year, state education officials said the progress was not enough, and pinned some of the good news on lowered standards — not on better student performance.
The standards of learning data also showed that schools that returned to in-person instruction sooner fared considerably better than schools that remained virtual or hybrid longer.Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin tied the results to school closures, and pledged to address disparities. Youngkin, who campaigned on reforming the state’s schools, has argued that liberal policies — like equity initiatives — have made Virginia schools a failure, a narrative that has been condemned and challenged by teacher unions and superintendents. In the spring, his administration put out a report that was criticized for cherry-picking data to make the state’s schools seem worse than they really are.
Not long after schools closed in March 2020, the state canceled standardized exams. But the exams were reinstated the following year, when many schools remained virtual for all or part of the school year. Students, as expected, fared poorly in 2021, and did considerably better in 2022.