The UK Covid-19 Inquiry is marking Back to School Week by sharing what children, young people, parents and professionals have told us about the pandemic’s impact on education, learning and school life.
The Inquiry’s ‘Children and Young People’ (Module 8) investigation examines the impact of the pandemic on children and young people in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. This includes those with special educational needs and disabilities and from a diverse range of ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds. The Inquiry will publish its Module 8 report in the first half of 2027.
The impact was severe, and for many, long lasting. Children and young people lost educational opportunities, they lost social interaction, they lost the protection from abuse they needed, they lost loved ones. Some suffered and are still suffering the debilitating consequences of Long Covid. Mental health issues in children and young people have increased significantly. This module will examine those issues and more
Public hearings for Module 8 took place over four weeks, from 29 September to 23 October 2025. The Chair of the Inquiry, Baroness Heather Hallett, heard evidence about the disruption to education faced by children and young people across the UK, including barriers to remote learning, the loss of routine and support that school provides and the long-term impact on children’s development and wellbeing.
Many of these children did not have enough or any digital devices in their families and the laptops supposedly being provided by the government did not ever arrive in many cases
The experiences of children, young people, parents, carers and professionals have been central to the Inquiry’s investigation into the pandemic’s impact on education. The Inquiry has drawn on its Every Story Matters public listening exercise, its landmark Children and Young People’s Voices research project and public hearings to understand how school life was disrupted for a generation of children.
My motivation dropped – not just for schoolwork, but for everything.
Through the Children and Young People’s Voices project, the Inquiry enabled 600 children and young people to share their experiences of living through the pandemic. Participants, now aged 10 to 23, were between 5 and 18 years old during that unique period. Many recalled living through an “empty time” of lockdown, when normal routines and young people’s fundamentally important milestones simply disappeared. Others described carrying a “weight of responsibility” as they took on extremely challenging caring roles and responsibilities within their homes.
I didn’t like that at lunch time or break time, I couldn’t play with my friends, I was just stuck at home. If I was at school I would have played with my friends, but I was just at home.
For children with special educational needs and disabilities, the loss of familiar routines and specialist support presented particular difficulties. Professionals also told the Inquiry that for some children, school was more than a place of learning; it was a place of safety.
For those children suffering through any kind of abuse, whether that be emotional or physical or neglect, those dynamics obviously changed. Because these children had no safe space to go, school was their safe space. They couldn’t get out, which was very difficult.
Not all experiences of learning from home were negative. Some children, particularly those who found the classroom environment overwhelming, described unexpected benefits.
I don’t do well in crowds and then at that point, I also… I’m diagnosed autism. I guess it was nice not to have stressful school environment
The return to school after lockdowns also brought its own challenges, with some children and young people describing heightened anxiety about being back in busy classrooms and around other people after months of isolation.
Not leaving the house… and then having to try and get used to being in public again, and going to school… definitely contributed to, like, my anxiety being a lot worse
Parents and educators also spoke about the impact on younger children starting school for the first time, many of whom missed out on the early years experiences that help build foundational skills.
This Back to School Week, I want to thank all the children, young people, families and carers who took the time to share their pandemic story with the Inquiry.
Through our Every Story Matters public listening exercise and our Children and Young People’s Voices project, the Inquiry heard directly from hundreds of children, young people, parents and professionals about the profound impact the pandemic had on education and school life. They told us about disrupted learning, lost routines and, for some, the loss of school as a place of safety and support. Their stories have helped the Inquiry investigate the impact of the pandemic on children and young people across the UK.
The Inquiry will publish Baroness Hallett’s report on children and young people in the first half of 2027. This will set out her findings and recommendations to help ensure children and young people are protected and supported in any future pandemic.
We will be monitoring the implementation of these recommendations, asking governments in all four nations to publish their response within six months of the report being published.
This generation will live longest with the consequences of the pandemic. It will have informed every aspect of their upbringing. The swift implementation of the Chair’s recommendations is vital in order to make sure the UK is better prepared for the next pandemic.
At the start of the Module 8 public hearings, the Inquiry screened an impact film. It features parents, caregivers, education professionals and young people across the UK speaking about their experiences during the pandemic. Impact films were shown at the beginning of hearings to set the context and tone, ensuring proceedings were grounded in people’s experiences from the outset. They feature the voices of people from across the UK and are a reminder of the human impact at the heart of the Inquiry’s work.
(Please note: the Module 8 impact film contains personal accounts that include references to bereavement, end-of-life care, hospital admission and the emotional and mental health impacts of the pandemic.)
Watch the Module 8 impact film on the Inquiry’s website.
Every day of the Inquiry’s Module 8 public hearings can also be watched back on the Inquiry’s YouTube channel.
The Inquiry has so far published reports for Module 1 ‘Resilience and Preparedness’, Module 2 ‘Core Decision-making and Political Governance’, Module 3 ‘Healthcare’, Module 4 ‘Vaccines and Therapeutics’ and Module 5 ‘Procurement’. Progress on the implementation of recommendations can be tracked on the Monitoring of Inquiry Recommendations page on the Inquiry’s website.
The UK Covid-19 Inquiry will publish its sixth report, Module 6 ‘Care Sector’, on Tuesday 20 October 2026 and its seventh report, Module 7 ‘Test, Trace and Isolate’, on Thursday 19 November 2026.
Both reports will be published on the Inquiry website at 12pm on their respective publication dates. The Chair of the Inquiry, Baroness Heather Hallett, will present her findings and recommendations in video statements on the Inquiry’s YouTube channel immediately after each publication.
The remaining three reports – Module 8 ‘Children and Young People’, Module 9 ‘Economic Response’ and Module 10 ‘Impact on Society’ – will be published in the first half of 2027.
A full list of the Inquiry’s investigations can be found on the Inquiry’s website.