DENVER (KDVR) — Colorado kids suffered worse blows to their math skills than their reading skills since the pandemic, according to the Nation’s Report Card which measures student knowledge across subjects.

The COVID pandemic interrupted schooling patterns across the country, resulting in a widespread learning loss. Now that a relatively uninterrupted school year has begun, test scores are showing the loss’s depth.

The National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NEAP, tests gauge student learning in mathematics and reading. Students take them in fourth, eighth and twelfth grades. Average scores declined in both subjects and grades nationally in 2022 as compared to 2019.

Colorado had some of the nation’s deepest declines in math testing. Reading scores, however, were less deeply impacted.

Among eighth graders, Colorado had the nation’s ninth-worst decline. Student scores dropped 10 points from 2019 to 2022.

Performance was better among fourth graders, but still among the nation’s lower half. It had the 16th-highest decline in math scores among this age group, dropping six points in 2022.

The drop in math scores was about equal to the national average. Reading scores, however, dropped less than the national average.

Colorado’s fourth graders and eighth graders still saw their scores drop. Amongst fourth graders, though, the drop of two points was slightly less than the national three-point drop in scores.