The month of March marks the five-year anniversary of the event that forever changed U.S. K-12 public education: the COVID-19 pandemic. The immediate effect of the President’s COVID-19 emergency declaration was that public schools closed their doors and went into lockdown mode. This lockdown produced long-term consequences for K-12 education.
One of these consequences is how dissatisfied Americans are today with public education. From 2019 to 2025, Gallup’s annual public satisfaction survey shows that the percentage of adults who report feeling dissatisfied with K-12 public education increased from 62% to 73%, with those who felt satisfied at the lowest level since 2001.
