The Australian Government’s interventions during the pandemic, such as school closures and lockdowns, aimed to stop the spread of COVID-19. However, these interventions may have had unintended impacts on Australian children in terms of learning losses and widened the educational gap between children of different socio-economic backgrounds and geographical locations. We know little about the causal impacts of these interventions and the extent to which the Government’s welfare support at the time lessened those impacts. We are also unclear about how best to now use Government support to address those impacts on children’s skill development.

This ARC Discovery Project aims to identify the causal effects of counter-COVID school closures, stay-at-home mandates and government support payments on the educational and developmental outcomes of Australian children. It will establish, for the first time, a comprehensive causal evidence base on the average and distributional impacts of these policies on children across the spectrum of schooling years from preschool to secondary school completion.

This project expects to advance our understanding of child skill accumulation and the relative importance of schools, parents, peers and government intervention. Anticipated benefits include providing policy recommendations to restore student learning outcomes and reduce educational inequality in Australia.

Funding

This project is funded by an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Project grant from 2024 to 2027. Funding amount: $546,194.