I love that you touched on certain ages of kids being the most affected, or as you said, challenging.

For us, it was the students who were 6th and 9th graders during Spring 2020. While they have generally bounced back, I've noticed in the last two years that there are behavioral/commitment issues on top of playing ability issues that are unique to those grade levels.

We are in West Texas and came back in-person in the Fall of 2020, so we were as "normal" as possible, but I say that with a grain of salt.

The reason I think these two grades had the most difficulty with Covid is due to the time of year they missed and the completion of that year.

Because they missed the last 25% of the year, our 9th graders missed their first HS UIL Concert and Sight-reading contest, their end of year banquet, spring concert and auditions for the next year. This meant that they were still effectively freshmen along with our actual freshmen in Spring 2021.

You may say, well those 9th graders had at least been to UIL contests in JH and, of course, you are correct. However, like many JH to HS programs, our 9th graders take a big leap in repertoire. It is not uncommon for the students to increase grade level as much as three grade levels from JH to HS (but on average usually two. E.g. - Some of our 9th graders this year have only played two grade 1's at JH contest. Today they will perform in a HS NV Band that is playing a 4 and a 3 and a challenging march.)

Sixth graders missed the 2nd most important part of the year: the end. Everything we do during the beginner year is geared to that last 25% of the year: Scale Incentives (we had just barely started), End of Year Concert/Contest (they don't really get to play in a full band setting until then), End of Year Parties (always help with retention... guess how the retention is with our current 8th graders...) and more advanced skills being learned due to trying to "beat the calendar" with those students.

(By the way, the first Six Weeks of the beginner band student's year is THE most important. It sets the tone for literally everything you want to ever achieve in your band program from grade 6 to 12. Some of us need to take those six weeks much more seriously. Another post, another day?)