“The pandemic was a big shift in ways that we couldn’t imagine and that we could not foresee in that moment,” said Spanish teacher Beatriz Ezquerra, who has taught at Townsend Harris for 24 years.
Since the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been debate over whether Gen Z has the capability to succeed academically. When the pandemic started in 2020, current high school students, who were born between 2008 and 2011, were in grades three to six. During these years, children are expected to acquire “a wide range of academic skills” and develop advanced problem solving skills.
In January, Jared Horvath, a neuroscientist at Harvard University, testified before The Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee that Gen Z “is the first generation to underperform across every cognitive measure.” Since his testimony, tabloids such as the The New York Post have cited Horvath’s testimony to make the claim Gen Z is the first generation “officially dubbed dumber” than the last generation.
In his testimony, Horvath said that “once countries adopt digital technology widely in schools, performance seems to go down.” He continued, saying that “Kids who use computers about five hours per day in school for learning purposes” score lower on standardized assessments than those who “rarely or never” use technology in the classroom. Due the prevalence of technology around and after the pandemic, it could be hard to say whether pandemic school closures are a driving force behind this alleged intellectual decline.
Research indicates that pandemic era school closures contributed to an already existing decline in students’ overall academic performance. To address this existing decline, NYC implemented MAP Benchmark testing at 76 academically underperforming schools in 2019 before the pandemic. Since the pandemic began, these kinds of test have been used as universal screeners across the city to address pandemic-related learning issues. A January 2025 study analyzing pre- and post-pandemic testing results indicated lower overall scores in core subjects such as math and reading, and a clear “learning loss” from before the pandemic. These exams are still begin administered three times a year to freshmen and sophomores at THHS; last month, teachers administered digital MAP tests in both English and mathematics.
According to Assistant Principal of English Ryan Dunbar, the adaptive nature of MAP tests makes them effective at pinpointing individual students’ learning gaps. Regarding how teachers use these results, Mr. Dunbar said it varies from pushing students towards certain class book clubs to giving them extra attention in class during instruction.
“I think the MAP exam, if students are taking it seriously and the teachers make it clear that it should be taken seriously, does a good job at identifying students that need additional intervention,” said Mr. Dunbar.
However, senior Agnieszka Nalepa said that “most of the years I’ve had [teachers] tell us to just get the [MAP exam] over with because the scores mean nothing.” Sophomore Sena Shew also said that her teachers have not addressed MAP results in class.
The Classic spoke to students and teachers about Gen Z students’ capability to succeed academically. Overall, students and teachers commonly expressed the idea that technology is contributing to a potential decline in Gen Z students’ academic performance, though they differ in how much of the change they attribute to the pandemic itself
Ms. Ezquerra said she sees the pandemic as a turning point in student motivation and performance. She said a decrease in students’ effort levels resulting from an increase in technology usage is the biggest change she has seen from before the pandemic. She said, “I think [the idea of effort] was more ingrained in the teenagers’ personalities. But nowadays, many times, it seems that there are so many things so handy, so ready to go, and so present everywhere that I think the kids are not prepared because they don’t know that there are things that require effort and practice.”
Others do not see those changes as a direct result of the pandemic. Rather, shifts in how students spend their time both in and out of the classroom may play the defining role in Gen Z’s academic performance.
Senior Mark Mbhogo mentioned how AI has contributed to a decline in students’ effort. “Many students see AI as a way to get the work done with minimal effort, which reduces the learning experience massively,” he said.
Freshman Priya Cruz-Tillery said that “all [her] 8th grade teacher would talk about is how our generation is so bad because we never use pencil and paper anymore.” To address what she saw as this problem, her teacher then required that all class work be done with pencil and paper.
Sophomore Alma Toke-Nichols offered a possible explanation for the change in Gen Z students’ effort levels. She said it wasn’t necessarily the pandemic or AI use that led to this, but instead an overreliance on social media. “I think that we base ourselves on impossible standards, both physically and mentally, which brings us down and gives no one motivation to work harder, leading to a more general laziness,” she said.
Given that the pandemic was six years ago and that none of today’s high school students were in high school before the pandemic, it could be hard to determine gaps in student learning using the pandemic as a benchmark.
Classical Language teacher Christopher Amanna said “I don’t know how much we can ascribe [the change in student’s abilities] to the pandemic,” citing “generational changes.”
Mathematics teacher Wen Yu Liu added that “students are on electronics a lot more” than even six years ago when the pandemic started.
So, can Gen Z students succeed?
Senior Annana Ali said that “Even with AI, expectations are still high and students are still constantly being challenged. Using AI doesn’t mean we’re slower or less capable. It means that we’re adopting and learning how to work smarter, not harder, and it’s not our fault that we’re utilizing tools that exist in our time.”
Junior Celeste Bagga said that there is no truth in claims of Gen Z students being weaker than students in past generations. “We are the product of our environment, and I feel that we, at least the people that I see, are doing a good job, and I have a lot of faith in the people around me that they will be able to make true differences,” she said. “I see a lot of ambition.”
Teachers that spoke to The Classic generally do not doubt Gen Z’s ability to succeed either, despite noting a decrease in effort that students put into their work and the increase in students using technology such as AI as a shortcut to complete their schoolwork.
For mathematics teacher Aleeza Widman-Loew, expectations of what a student should be like has been changing since before the pandemic. “I think [the standard for students] is just the alignment of what the expectation [was when] you grew up with how your expectation is for yourself and imposing that onto [someone] else,” she said.
“I think, like, times are changing, so people are changing, and, hopefully the good, hardworking ones rise to the challenge of whatever needs to get done,” said Ms. Liu.
