Grade retention is the practice of requiring a student who has been in a given grade level for a full school year to remain at that level for a subsequent school year (Jackson, 1975). It is one way educational policymakers and practitioners can deal with student heterogeneity, besides ability grouping, tracking, etc. Its use varies considerably across countries, from 0% to more than 30% of students having to repeat at least once (Goos, Pipa, & Peixoto, 2020; Valbuena, Mediavilla, Choi, & Gil, 2020).

The effectiveness of grade retention has been topic of theoretical debate for decades, with both proponents and opponents basing themselves on diverse theories in education, psychology, and sociology (i.e., maturationist developmental theory, sociocultural developmental theory, contextual developmental theory, self-efficacy theory, self-determination theory, social comparison theory, social control theory). A detailed discussion can be found in Goos et al. (2020). Similarly, research on the effectiveness of grade retention also has a long history, going back to as early as 1908 (Allen, Chen, Willson, & Hughes, 2009; Holmes, 1989; Jackson, 1975; Jimerson, 2001; Xia & Kirby, 2009). Since 2000, and especially since 2010, many new, methodologically sophisticated studies have been conducted on this topic, in a variety of countries across the world, looking at several outcomes, using different comparison approaches. A recent meta-analysis of these studies has shown that grade retention has an overall zero effect, with effects, however, differing modestly across country types, retention applications, outcome domains, outcome timings, comparison approaches, and methods used (Goos, Pipa, & Peixoto, 2020). The same meta-analysis has also revealed that important gaps (still) exist in the field of grade retention effectiveness research, among which the overrepresentation of (a) US studies and (b) studies focusing on effects on repeaters’ development in the short run (Goos et al., 2020).

Our grade retention effectiveness symposium aims to address these gaps. First, our symposium will bring together 4 studies from 4 countries outside the US, namely Portugal, Germany, Belgium, and Luxembourg, all in the OECD ‘top 5’ of grade retention prevalence (Valbuena et al., 2020). Second, our symposium will bring together 4 studies focusing on outcome domains so far less examined, yet very informative for educational policymakers and practitioners. More specifically, effects on repeaters’ psychosocial functioning (particularly in the longer run), civic attitudes, and longer-run school marks will be presented. An overview of the data, research design, and data-analysis procedure of the 4 symposium studies is presented in Table 1. Our symposium will close with a discussion comparing the results and linking them to educational policy and practice.

Table 1

Descriptive characteristics of the 4 symposium studies

Study

General information

Method

Country

Data

Research design

Data analysis procedure

1

Portugal

PISA-2018

cross-sectional study, quasi-experimental design

3-level linear regression models

2

Germany

NEPS-Starting-Cohort 3

4-year-longitudinal study, quasi-experimental design

2-level linear regression models

3

Belgium

PISA-2018

cross-sectional study

3-level linear regression models

4

Luxembourg

LUCET

7-year-longitudinal study, quasi-experimental design

ANOVA

Allen, C. S., Chen, Q., Willson, V. L., & Hughes, J. N. (2009). Quality of research design moderates effects of grade retention on achievement: A Meta-analytic, multi-level analysis. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 31, 480–499.doi:10.3102/0162373709352239 Goos, M., Pipa, J., & Peixoto, F. (2020). Effectiveness of grade retention: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Manuscript under review [Educational Research Review]. Holmes, C. T. (1989). Grade-level retention effects: A meta-analysis of research studies. In L. A. Shepard & M. L. Smith (Eds.), Flunking grades: Research and policies on retention (pp. 16-33). London, United Kingdom: The Falmer Press. Jackson, G. B. (1975). The research evidence on the effects of grade retention. Review of Educational Research, 45(4), 613-635. doi:10.2307/1170067 Jimerson, S. R. (2001). A synthesis of grade retention research: Looking backward and moving forward. The California School Psychologist, 6, 47-59. doi:10.1007/BF03340883 Valbuena, J., Mediavilla, M., Choi, A., & Gil, M. (2020). Effects of grade retention policies: A literature review of empirical studies applying causal inference. Journal of Economic Surveys. Advance online publication. doi:10.1111/joes.12406 Xia, N., & Kirby, S. N. (2009). Retaining students in grade: A literature review of the effects of retention on students' academic and nonacademic outcomes. Retrieved from http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/technical_reports/2009/RAND_TR678.pdf