South Dakota Dept. of Education report card: incomplete

The South Dakota Department of Education released its 2020-21 report card Thursday. It’s a measure of student and school performance.

However, this year’s report card is incomplete due to the number of students who did not take state assessments due to the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the report, only 53% of students met or exceeded the expectations on the state’s English Langauge Arts assessment and only 43% of students met or exceeded expectations on the state’s math assessment.

The department says the data reinforces last summer’s COVID-19 Impact Report, which suggests that COVID-19 reduced school attendance and that hurt learning.

Just over six-percent of public school students missed 30 or more days of school during the pandemic, which is nearly double from the previous school year.

October 15, 2021