By Betsy Hill and Roger Stark
Editor’s Note: This is the final installment in a five-part series.
The COVID-19 pandemic has deepened existing disparities in education, hitting hardest those students who were already at risk: children in low-income communities, students with learning disabilities, and English language learners. These groups were already performing well below national averages, and pandemic-related disruptions have widened achievement gaps and threaten long-term prospects for many learners.
Throughout this series we have argued that equity in education requires more than equal access to devices and internet. True equity must include access to effective curriculum, trained teachers, safe learning environments—and critically—the development of each student’s cognitive skills, the mental capacities that enable learning.
During the pandemic much attention rightly focused on technology access and remote instruction. Devices and connectivity are essential for participation in distance learning and for preparing students for a digitally driven workplace. Yet devices and teacher training, while necessary, are not sufficient when many students lack the cognitive bandwidth needed to process and retain new information.
Consider students with weaknesses in visual or auditory processing: they may not grasp content on a screen any better than on a classroom whiteboard. Students with limited attention or working memory may only capture fragments of lessons, whether in person or online. These learners do not truly have access to instruction because the cognitive processes required to learn—attention, memory, processing speed, reasoning—are underdeveloped.
This issue extends beyond students with formal diagnoses and beyond the effects of poverty alone, though poverty does correlate with weaker development of key cognitive functions. In many high-poverty schools we’ve seen the majority of students demonstrate significant deficits—often one standard deviation below average—in working memory and attention. These cognitive gaps limit how effectively students can benefit from teaching, no matter how good the instruction or technology.
Think of two types of bandwidth. One is the digital connection—devices, broadband, educational platforms. The other is the brain’s ability to take in, organize, store, and retrieve information. The latter—what we’ve termed the “last eight inches”—is the final and most crucial mile in ensuring that instruction translates to learning.
Addressing student cognitive capacity requires actions our education system has not consistently prioritized. Specifically, schools need to be able to:
- Assess each student’s cognitive strengths and weaknesses;
- Remediate and strengthen weaker cognitive processes, while building on strengths; and
- Design instruction, curriculum, and technology that align with scientific understanding of how learning happens, rather than relying on tradition or folklore.
The middle articles in this series laid out practical, scalable approaches to each of these steps. Today there are affordable, research-informed tools and methods that can build cognitive capacity at scale and improve equity in student outcomes.
Beyond the moral imperative, there is a strong economic incentive to act quickly. Analysts from McKinsey & Company and the OECD estimate the pandemic’s long-term cost in lost learning and productivity could range from hundreds of billions to many trillions of dollars in present value terms. The OECD also estimates that raising average reading and math scores in the U.S. to minimum proficiency levels could yield enormous gains in GDP—numbers that make clear the macroeconomic stakes of widespread learning loss.
There is also a near-term educational opportunity: interventions that build cognitive skills have produced measurable academic improvements in short periods. Several programs show students gaining months or even years of academic progress in 12–14 weeks. Rather than simply extending school hours or asking teachers to do more of the same, we can accelerate learning by making instruction easier to access and more effective for students whose cognitive processes need strengthening.
We intentionally place learning before teaching. Too much energy in education focuses on teaching techniques, when the real goal is learning. When educators understand that learning emerges from a network of interrelated cognitive processes shaped by both instruction and experience, they can design more equitable learning experiences that meet each student where they are.
Research suggests cognitive ability explains a substantial portion of the variance in academic performance—estimates often cite figures around forty percent. This influence exceeds that of time on task or even the quality of teaching or curriculum alone. Addressing cognitive and emotional readiness is therefore essential: neuroscience shows that even excellent teaching can have limited impact if a student’s cognitive and emotional capacity to learn is not supported.
Executive functions—working memory, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility—bridge cognition and social-emotional competence. These skills underpin attention, self-regulation, and problem solving, and are integral to a child’s readiness to engage in learning and to participate successfully in school and life.
Finally, the risk of inaction is severe. The OECD warns that the current cohort of students will be less prepared for further schooling and the labor force than previous cohorts unless schools are improved, not merely restored to their pre-2019 state. The pandemic has exposed stark inequalities and created momentum for change. Rather than attempting to return to an old status quo, education systems should seize this moment to reorient toward measurable learning for every student.
If equality means giving everyone the same resources, equity means ensuring each student gets the resources they need to learn and thrive. Developing cognitive skills must be central to that effort. Doing so will make learning more equitable, elevate long-term economic prospects, and help prevent an entire generation from bearing the consequences of lost learning.
Read part one here
Read part two here
Read part three here
Read part four here
About the authors
Betsy Hill is President of BrainWare Learning Company, which develops learning capacity through the practical application of neuroscience. An experienced educator, she has studied neuroscience and education with experts in the field. She previously chaired the board of trustees at Chicago State University and teaches strategic thinking in the MBA program at Lake Forest Graduate School of Management. She holds a Master of Arts in Teaching and an MBA from Northwestern University.
Roger Stark is Co‑founder and CEO of BrainWare Learning Company. For more than a decade he has led efforts to make comprehensive cognitive skills assessment and training widely available and affordable. Drawing on decades of clinical collaboration, he helped develop a comprehensive, integrated cognitive training program delivered online that has been widely researched and implemented.
This article was originally published by The Learning Counsel, a research institute and news media hub focused on the shift in education toward digital curriculum.