This report looks at how states’ strict standards for grade promotion may affect retention rates. There is considerable evidence that retention rates already are high in most states and that using scores on state tests as the primary criterion for promotion likely will increase those rates dramatically. The report concludes that neither social promotion nor retention is the answer and that both "solutions" do more harm than good. Instead, states and schools should work hard to meet the individual needs of struggling students during the school year and in summer school through ongoing student assessment and interventions.

Keywords: social promotion, retention, grade repetition, testing, assessment, early intervention, summer school, reading

View This Publication (63K)

This publication is an Adobe Acrobat PDF file. To view, you will need to have the free Acrobat Reader installed. The latest reader is downloadable for free from Adobe.

For information on other SREB publications, please see our Publications Catalog.

To order a hard copy of this or any other SREB publication, call (404) 875-9211, Ext. 236 or email publications@sreb.org.