Grade Retention - Research

Research

There is no conclusive evidence that grade retention is either significantly helpful or harmful, and much of the existing research has been criticized as being methodologically invalid. Three different kinds of studies exist or have been proposed, and each has its inherent pitfalls:

1. Studies which compare students who were retained to students who were considered for retention, but were eventually promoted. These studies favor social promotion. However, the promoted students were not retained because the schools believed them to be stronger or more personally mature students (as evidenced by the decision to promote them). These studies are unfairly biased in favor of social promotion because they compare the better/promoted students to the weaker/retained students.
2. Studies which compare retained students to their own prior performance. These studies favor grade retention. However, these studies are biased because they do not adequately control for personal growth or changes in environmental factors (such as poverty).
3. Studies which randomly assign a large pool of borderline students to promotion or retention. This style of research is methodologically sound and, if performed on a sufficiently large scale and with sufficiently detailed information collected, would provide valuable or even definitive information. However, schools and parents are unwilling to have a child's future affected by a random assignment, and so these studies are simply not done.

Grade retention may be much less significant than whether or not a struggling student receives intensive remedial help. However, based on the existing (if flawed) studies, the following conclusions are widely believed:

Academic outcomes: Retained students are 2 to 11 times more likely to drop out of school when compared to underachieving, but promoted, peers. (Study style #1 favors social promotion.) Students often improve during the year following grade retention, particularly if additional instruction is provided. (Study style #2 favors grade retention.) However, these gains are normally lost in two to three years.

Non-academic outcomes: Retention is associated with poor “social adjustment, attitudes toward school, behavioral outcomes, and attendance.” Retention is a “stronger predictor of delinquency than socioeconomic status, race, or ethnicity,” and is also a strong predictor of drug and alcohol use and teenage pregnancy. (Study style #1 favors social promotion.)