@EdWorkingPaper{ai26-1490,
title = "The Causal Effect of Student Absences Post Pandemic: Evidence from Three School Systems",
author = "Yu Hung Yaow, Seth Gershenson, David Blazar, Ethan Hutt",
institution = "Annenberg Institute at Brown University",
number = "1490",
year = "2026",
month = "May",
URL = "http://www.edworkingpapers.com/ai26-1490",
abstract = {Researchers, educators, and policymakers have long worried about the consequences of student absences for educational achievement and attainment—concerns that have grown with the significant rise in absenteeism during and following the Covid-19 pandemic. Using administrative data from Maryland, North Carolina, and a large urban school district, we find that the impact of absences on test scores was modestly (about 5 to 20%) smaller in 2022-23 than in 2018-19 but still practically and statistically significant. Consistent with prior research, these harmful effects of absences are approximately linear and exhibit little heterogeneity across race and gender pre-Covid. In Maryland, the impact of tenth-grade absences on high-school graduation and 2-year college enrollment was much (about 40%) smaller after the pandemic than before, but the impact of absences on any (2- or 4-year) college enrollment increased slightly. Post-Covid reductions in the harmful effects were larger for white students on test scores and larger for Black students on graduation.},
}