A Study on the Impact that the COVID-19 Pandemic had on STEM Learning in Elementary School Students*

Last year STEM learning was impacted due to the COVID-19 pandemic when multiple schools had to provide instruction through virtual learning environments.  Authors of this research developed a model to measure the impact the pandemic had on successful STEM learning [Carmona et al, 2020] using the concept of Student Engagement (i.e., effort, participation, autonomy, competence, sense of belonging, and personal relationships).  This model correlates student engagement and academic performance to measure the manner in which the pandemic affected STEM learning. Early results show decreases in certain areas as expected; however, there are also unexpected results implying that some behaviors, perceptions, and constructs may have actually increased in other areas of the STEM learning process.  In this presentation, we discuss how these results were obtained, how the variables of interest were measured, and the results and impact on STEM learning from multiple perspectives (i.e., teachers, students, independent observers).  We will also discuss the impact the pandemic had on mathematics and science scores and student engagement and compare this to pre-pandemic levels.