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Finds that classrooms were already academically diverse pre-pandemic, with students spanning off track, on track, and advanced achievement levels. After the pandemic, overall diversity looks similar, but slightly more students are off track and are farther from grade-level proficiency, increasing instructional demands to accelerate learning. Uses classroom composition and distance to proficiency to interpret conditions teachers face.",{"@graph":69,"@context":122},[70,84,105],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/academically-diverse-classrooms-deeper-needs-what-teachers-face-after-the-pandemic/586385/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/academically-diverse-classrooms-deeper-needs-what-teachers-face-after-the-pandemic/586385.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Quinn Holloway","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-31","2026-10-15",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":44},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"What does the brief define as “academic diversity”?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"Academic diversity is defined as the spread of student achievement levels within a classroom.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"How did the pandemic affect academic diversity in classrooms overall?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"After the pandemic, the overall academic diversity of classrooms looks largely similar to prior years.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"What instructional impact does the brief highlight after COVID-19?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"Slightly more students in each classroom are off track, and those off track are further from grade-level proficiency, increasing the need for instruction that accelerates learning.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":124,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":126,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":128,"site_id":62},586385,1792167959,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":131},{"doc_id":128,"user_id":132,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":44,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":39,"language":139,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":140,"faqs":141,"seo_title":142,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":143,"read_time":46,"preview_page_count":4},2336474466712,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_a8503ba1806abce46bf441b54a3ca4cd","BRIEF  \nAcademically diverse classrooms, deeper needs:  \nWhat teachers face after the pandemic  \nMegan Kuhfeld, Emily Morton, Karyn Lewis, Scott Peters  \nApril 2026  \nKEY FINDINGS  \n• The typical classroom was academically diverse well before the pandemic, with students spanning a wide range of achievement levels.  \n• After the pandemic, the overall academic diversity of classrooms (e. g. , the share of students who are on-and off track for grade-level proficiency) looks largely similar to prior years.  \n• Slightly more students in each classroom are off track, but those who are off track are now further from grade-level proficiency, increasing the instructional demands to accelerate learning.  \nClassrooms routinely include students with very different academic needs. In a single elementary school classroom, teachers are expected to support students who are far below grade level, those who are on track, and others who are already advanced. Meeting this wide range of needs is the everyday reality of teaching.  \nWhile academic diversity is widely acknowledged, it is rarely described in concrete terms. Conversations about differentiated instruction often rely on broad statements about “meeting students where they are,” without clarifying what that actually looks like inside the typical classroom. How many students are struggling to reach grade-level proficiency? How many are on track? How wide is the range of instructional need teachers are managing at the same time?  \nThese questions matter even more in the wake of COVID-19 . Research has shown that pandemic-related school disruptions disproportionately affected lower-achieving students, widening the differences in achievement between low-and high-achieving students across the country. However, less is known about how those losses translate into instructional conditions for a teacher in a classroom. Were lower-achieving students more negatively impacted than high-achieving students in the same classroom, increasing the need for differentiation? Or did the pandemic impact low-and high-achievers in the same classroom similarly, resulting in greater needs to accelerate learning without increasing the need to differentiate?  \nIn this brief, we use MAP® Growth™ test scores and classroom roster data to examine the academic diversity in elementary school classrooms before and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Statistical measures of variability  \nGlossary  \nAcademic diversity: Spread of student achievement levels within a classroom  \nGrade-level proficiency: Mastery of academic standards/skills expected for a given grade level as defined by a student’s state (typically measured through the state’s summative end-ofyear assessment)  \nOn track for proficiency: A measure of whether a student is likely to score at or above the proficient level on the end-of-year assessment based on MAP Growth linking studies  \n“Typical” classroom: In this study, we use “typical” to refer to the average classroom within our sample  \nDifferentiated instruction: the process of identifying students’ individual learning strengths/ needs and adapting lessons to match them  \nNWEA Academically diverse classrooms, deeper needs: What teachers face after the pandemic | 2  \nshow that achievement distributions widened after the pandemic, particularly at the lower end.1 However, these measures can be difficult to interpret in instructional terms. In this brief, we focus instead on classroom composition and distance to proficiency to better reflect the conditions teachers experience in practice. We ask three practical questions: What did academic diversity look like in a typical classroom prior to the pandemic? How did it change after the pandemic? And what do those changes mean for the instructional demands teachers face today?  \nThe typical elementary classroom was academically diverse even prior to the pandemic.  \nWe begin by establishing a baseline: what academic diversity looked like in an average elementary classroom bef","cbCaiek4NQ52HhEN","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaiek4NQ52HhEN","pdf",649482,"English","# Key Findings\n# Purpose and Motivation\n# Definitions and Measures\n# What Academic Diversity Looked Like Before the Pandemic\n## Typical Fifth-Grade Math Classroom (Fall 2019)\n# Changes After the Pandemic and Instructional Demands","[{\"question\":\"What does the brief define as “academic diversity”?\",\"answer\":\"Academic diversity is defined as the spread of student achievement levels within a classroom.\"},{\"question\":\"How did the pandemic affect academic diversity in classrooms overall?\",\"answer\":\"After the pandemic, the overall academic diversity of classrooms looks largely similar to prior years.\"},{\"question\":\"What instructional impact does the brief highlight after COVID-19?\",\"answer\":\"Slightly more students in each classroom are off track, and those off track are further from grade-level proficiency, increasing the need for instruction that accelerates learning.\"}]","Academically Diverse Classrooms, Deeper Needs - What Teachers Face After the Pandemic | PDF",1792057766]