Project Description: Promotion and Retention Policies is synthesizing research on the effects of retention and promotion policies, and looking at the long-term effects of these policies in a large urban school district. This project is also investigating alternatives to repetition in the early grades, including transitional first grades and developmental kindergarten. Grade repetition-retaining students in grade is a common response to student failure and is especially prevalent in districts serving minority and economically/educationally disadvantaged populations. However, reviews of grade repetition do not support it as a valid educational practice. This project aims to investigate grade repetition through three activities: (1) a best evidence synthesis of the effects of grade promotion and retention (Activity 20015); (2) a study of longitudinal effects of grade repetition (Activity 20016); and (3) a study of alternative approaches to dealing with school readiness variability (Activity 20017).
Project Director: Karweit, Nancy L.
Institution: Johns Hopkins University
Activity ID: 7116-20015
Name of Activity: Synthesis of Research on Grade Repetition/Promotion Policies
Description of Activity: The study is synthesizing research on the effects of retention and promotion policies, and looking at the long-term effects of these policies in a large urban school district. This project is also investigating alternatives to repetition in the early grades, including transitional first grades and developmental kindergarten. This activity is a best evidence synthesis of the literature on the effects of grade promotion and retention. The synthesis is intended to supplement recent meta-analyses by controlling for study design and quality and by examining district and state level evaluations of promotion policies which have been overlooked in previous reviews.
Syntheses of the research and analyses of the effects of grade repetition occurred in the first two years. The development and evaluation of alternative approaches to grade repetition took place during Years 1-5 as part of the development of the Success for All program.
Study Design: This best evidence synthesis of the literature on the effects of grade retention controls for important design defects in the studies reviewed. Examples of such defects include the lack of random assignment of eligible students to promotion/retention groups, the spurious inflation of test score results because retainees' scores are included with those of their younger classmates, etc.
Unit of Analysis: The unit of analysis is the individual study.
Generalizability: Because the criteria and techniques used to select research for review are not described, generalizability of the synthesis cannot be determined.
Sample Description: Best evidence synthesis criteria were used to select research for review.
Dependent Variables: The dependent variables are unspecified educational outcomes.
Independent Variables: The independent variable is the retention or promotion of students.
External Variables Controlled: Control variables include the design and quality of the studies reviewed.
Statement of Finding(s): Neither retention nor social promotion per se are effective at solving the problem of providing appropriate instruction for low performing students -- both policies are failures.
Description of Finding(s): This study finds that the research on the effects of grade retention can reach no clear conclusions about those effects for three reasons: Studies compare retained/promoted children on different bases (same-year comparisons usually find that the socially promoted student achieves better, whereas same-grade comparisons find no difference in achievement or that the retained student achieves better); studies usually do not specify what kind of program was provided for the retained or promoted students; and few studies cover an extended period of time so that longitudinal effects can be determined. Given these deficiencies, the conclusion drawn from a review of these studies is that neither retention nor social promotion are effective policies.
Are data from the study available? Yes
Activity ID: 7116-20016
Name of Activity: Longitudinal Effects of Grade Repetition
Description of Activity: The activity is synthesizing research on the effects of retention and promotion policies, and looking at the long-term effects of these policies in a large urban school district. This project is also investigating alternatives to repetition in the early grades, including transitional first grades and developmental kindergarten. Most analyses of grade repetition focus exclusively on immediate or next year effects. Because student achievement in the year of retention usually rises, it often appears that retention is a beneficial policy. However, as some studies have documented, this effect is generally spurious and of short duration.
This study, based upon a longitudinal data base for a large urban school district, investigates the long-term effects of grade retention with the dual objectives of clarifying the inflation and fadeout effects and identifying how later events such as school dropout and truancy are related to patterns of progression through the K12 system.
Syntheses of the research and analyses of the effects of grade repetition occurred in the first two years. The development and evaluation of alternative approaches to grade repetition as part of the development of the Success for All Program took place during Years 1-5.
Study Design: In this study, researchers use test score, attendance, and other data from Baltimore City to describe patterns of progression through the K12 system. Examination of test score results with and without retained students are undertaken to determine the extent of score inflation due to retention. Analyses of individual longitudinal records are undertaken to examine how progression patterns are related to dropping out and truancy, focusing particularly on the effects of timing and frequency of retentions.
Unit of Analysis: The unit of analysis is the individual student.
Generalizability: Because sample selection techniques are not described, the generalizability of the study findings cannot be determined.
Sample Description: The sample upon which this study is based consists of an unspecified number of K12 students in the Baltimore City public schools.
Dependent Variables: The dependent variables are test scores, truancy patterns, and dropout status.
Independent Variables: The independent variables are retention/promotion status and the timing and frequency of retentions.
External Variables Controlled: Control procedures/variables are not specified.
Statement of Finding(s): No findings were produced from the work in this study.
Description of Finding(s): No findings.
Are data from the study available? No
Activity ID: 7116-20017
Name of Activity: Alternatives to Repetition in the Early Grades
Description of Activity: This activity is synthesizing research on the effects of retention and promotion policies, and looking at the long-term effects of these policies in a large urban school district. This project is also investigating alternatives to repetition in the early grades, including transitional first grades and developmental kindergarten. This study examines strategies that school districts have adopted to deal with young children who may not be ready for school. These strategies typically include delaying entrance to school for a year or providing special services, such as a transitional first grade or developmental kindergarten. These approaches have drawbacks, however. Delayed school entrance may foster negative self-concepts in young children, and special services are often recommended on the basis of unreliable test results.
The objectives of this study are: (1) to investigate alternative approaches to school readiness variability (based on a survey of experts); (2) to observe schools employing promising practices (as identified by those experts); and (3) to develop and evaluate prototypical models for pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, and grade one programs.
Syntheses of the research and analyses of the effects of grade repetition occurred in the first two years. The development and evaluation of alternative approaches to grade repetition as part of the development of the Success for All program took place during Years 1-5.
Study Design: This study consists of four phases. In the first, approximately 50 experts in the area of early childhood education including scholars, policy makers, and school administrators are surveyed to determine their views on alternative approaches to variability in school readiness and their nominations of exemplary practices that cope with this problem.
In the second phase, schools employing promising practices, as identified in phase one, are observed. In the third phase, prototypical models for pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, and grade one programs are developed, based on observations made during phase two and expert guidance solicited during phase one. The effects of these models are also evaluated. In the fourth phase, the researchers conducted a best-evidence synthesis of the research on the effects of retention in kindergarten, placement in developmental kindergarten, and placement in transitional first grade, all of which are practices designed to provide children with an extra year schooling in kindergarten/first grade.
Unit of Analysis: The units of analysis are experts in the area of early childhood education and exemplary pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, and first grade programs.
Generalizability: The samples of experts and exemplary programs upon which this study is based are not representative of larger populations; therefore, opinions and findings are generalizable only to those experts and programs observed.
Sample Description: The first phase of this study is based on a purposive sample of approximately 50 experts in the area of early childhood education, including scholars, policy makers, and school administrators. The sample of exemplary pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, and grade one programs observed in phase two are identified by this panel of experts. The sample of programs reviewed in phase four are identified by best-evidence research synthesis criteria.
Dependent Variables: The dependent variables are not specified.
Independent Variables: The independent variables are not specified.
External Variables Controlled: Control groups were used in the best evidence synthesis studies.
Statement of Finding(s): Programs designed to provide children with an extra year of kindergarten/first grade have no more effect on student achievement than simply promoting the children into the first grade in the first place.
Description of Finding(s): Kindergarten retention holds students back to repeat a year; developmental kindergarten provides students with a year of kindergarten before they go into a "real" kindergarten, and transitional first grade provides students with a year of developmental first grade before they enter the "real" first grade. All three of these practices -- each costing children a year of their lives -- produced at best initial gains in achievement compared to other children, but those gains disappeared within one or two years. Thus the main effect found in second or third grade was that the children who had been given an extra year were achieving no better than comparable children who had been simply promoted into first grade.
Are data from the study available?
-###-
![[ Previous Project ]](/icons/prev.gif){kind=icon}
![[Center Description]](/icons/up.gif){kind=icon}
![[ Next Project ]](/icons/next.gif){kind=icon}