The Impact of COVID-19 School Closures on Learning: Evidence from Ghana

This project will estimate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and attendant school closures on the cognitive skills of Ghanaian children aged 14-96 months old. The study leverages the Ghana Caregiver and Child Panel Study (GCCPS), which has been tracking the cognitive development of children in Ghana since 2017. Three of our key milestone age groups (3.5, 5, and 7 year olds) were directly affected by the pandemic-related closure of pre-schools and schools (which lasted 9 months). This provides a unique opportunity to compare young children's cognitive development measures before and after the pandemic, to estimate both the loss in learning during the pandemic, and the pace of recovery (if any). We therefore seek funding to measure outcomes or as many children as possible at these three milestone ages in 2021 and early 2022. Our measurements include detailed data from the child's caregiver, which will allow us to examine heterogeneity by gender, socio-economic status, public/private school, and access to remote learning.