Interventions for at-risk students in early grades What is the impact of grade retention on student achievement and student dropout rates? On average, retained students do more poorly on follow-up measures of social adjustment, attitude toward school, behavioral outcomes, and attendance. In addition, students who have repeated a year are 20-30% more likely to drop out of school. In his synthesis of research, C. Thomas Holmes of the University of Georgia reviewed 63 controlled studies where retained students were followed up and compared to similar students who went directly on to the next grade. Fifty-four of those studies showed that when retained children went on to the next grade, they actually performed more poorly on average than if they had gone on without repeating. Only 9 of the 63 studies showed overall positive results, and most of these compared retained students who had received extra help through individualized programs and smaller classes to promoted control children who had not been given comparable assistance. Even with this extra assistance, the apparent benefits of retention tended to diminish over time so that differences in performance between retained and control children disappears. | |
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