Students have suffered educational disruption in combatting the spread of COVID-19.

Education policy and practice during the pandemic has faced uncertainty, with some a priori assumptions proven true, while others not.

The research tests the following a priori assumptions of home-based learning against the evidence that is now available:

• Disadvantaged students will suffer educationally from a digital divide.
• Students will suffer from a significant learning loss.
• Disadvantaged students will be disproportionately impacted in learning outcomes.
• The mental health impact on students will negatively affect their educational outcomes.
• Significant additional resourcing is required to address learning losses, especially those of disadvantaged students.

Key findings:

• There’s little evidence that disadvantaged students were disproportionately impacted accessing home-based learning supports.
• There’s mixed evidence of the scale and scope of learning loss.
• There’s no clear relationship between students’ demographics and their reported achievement during home-based learning.
• No significant relationship between students’ reported achievement and their mental and social health, but that their coping levels matter.
• Rather than significant additional resourcing, better investment of existing funding to improve teaching practice would be most effective.

Policy-makers and educators must make evidence-based decisions in advancing education policy and practice coming out of the pandemic.