Grade retention or repetition was essentially meaningless in the one-room schoolhouses of more than a century ago due to limited access to outside standards and the small scale of the school with only a few students in each age group, was conducive to individualized instruction.
[3] An alternative to grade retention due to failure is a policy of social promotion, with the idea that staying within their same age group is important.
Some academic scholars believe that underperformance must be addressed with intensive remedial help, such as summer school or after-school programs in contrast to failing and retaining the student.
This trend reversed in the 1980s as concerns about slipping academic standards rose, and the practice of grade retention in the United States has been climbing steadily ever since.
[7] There is no conclusive evidence that grade retention is significantly helpful, and much of the existing research has been methodologically invalid[9] due to the selection bias in the group allocation phase.
The three different types of studies that exist or have been proposed have inherent pitfalls to overcome before the resulting data can be deemed as accurate.
"Non-academic outcomes": Retention is commonly associated with poor social adjustment, disruptive behavior, negative attitudes towards school and low academic attendance.
[11] In New Zealand, secondary schools commonly use a system of internal academic streaming in which children of the same age are subdivided on the basis of ability, and lower achieving students (those who would be retained under the North American system) are taught in different classes, and at a different rate, from higher achieving students, but are kept within their own age group.
[12] In most cases where academic streaming is insufficient, additional special services are viewed as being preferential to grade retention, particularly when behavioral challenges are involved.
In elementary school, students are retained when they fail one of the basic areas: math, language and social sciences.
Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland commonly use grade retention.
They argue that retention is not a cost-effective response to poor performance when compared to cheaper or more effective interventions, such as additional tutoring and summer school.
[18] This change likely reflects the students' correct perception that they were statistically far more likely to repeat the sixth grade than to suffer the death of a parent or the loss of their vision.