Three types of intervention strategies are helping children make a successful transition into kindergarten: early intervention programs, school survival skill training, and delayed school entry. Early intervention programs are early childhood and preschool programs such as Head Start. The overall long-term effectiveness of such programs has…

This study reviews research and looks at promotion policies in 85 school districts, including the United States' 40 largest districts, describes the practices that support social promotion, and identifies the policy changes that will be necessary to break the social promotion-retention-social promotion cycle. Social promotion prevails in these…

This paper reports on phase 1 of a four-part study investigating the exceptionally high dropout rate among a specific Native American population (the Mississippi Choctaw). The population for this study was the eighth grade class enrolled in the six schools operating on the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indian reservation. Researchers used the…

Retention, the practice of requiring a student to repeat a particular grade or of delaying the entry to kindergarden or first grade of a child who is of appropriate chronological age, remains a common educational custom although little research exists to validate its effectiveness. The literature review on retention effects contained within this…

This study compares the McCarthy Scales of Children's Abilities (MSCA) and the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC) profiles of successful and unsuccessful preschoolers with learning disabilities. Subjects, 40 preschool students, were tested at the beginning and at the end of the preschool year and were placed into repeating or…

Part of the Eleventh Annual Report to the Ontario Ministry of Education, this report describes the grade and program location of students who entered kindergarten in Ottawa and Carleton, Ontario in 1974, known as the K-74 cohort. The first section of the report deals with the K-74 cohort; later sections deal with students who joined either early…

As adolescents enter high school in the ninth grade, they experience a transition unlike any previous school experience, and it exacts its toll from unprepared, unmotivated, or unwary students. An examination of achievement test averages across grades 1 through 12 for students in the Austin Independent School District (AISD) in Austin, Texas…

An investigation was made of standard, nonexperimentally administered Head Start programs in the Philadelphia School District. Findings replicate and extend past findings that Head Start children more often avoided serious school problems than did control children. Head Start children were less frequently retained as they moved through the…

The purpose of this paper is to present different aspects of the effects of grade retention on students and to consider what is best for the total development of the child. Studies show that grade retention does not ensure significant gains in achievement. However, studies seem to be less conclusive regarding retention due to the immaturity of…

Examination of the literature reveals that all reviews of research comparing grade retention policies with social promotion policies favor social promotion. Grade retention fails to ensure greater achievement, either by retained students or their classmates, and frequently leads to long-term damage in the areas of personal and social adjustment.…

THE PROBLEM OF SCHOOL DROPOUTS WAS CAUSED BY CONSISTENT FAILURE TO ACHIEVE IN REGULAR SCHOOL WORK, GRADE RETENTION, READING802RETARDATI RETARDATION, AND POOR SELF-IMAGE. THE CLUB'S STAFF WOULD HELP SOLVE THIS PROBLEM THROUGH TEACHING, DIRECTING, AND COUNSELING BOYS IN THE AREAS OF HEALTH, COMPATIBILITY, RESPECT, STAYING IN SCHOOL, PLANNING…

Seven separate reports survey the literature and current thinking in the following topic areas: optimum school and class sizes, organization of schools into appropriate grade-level groups, the benefits and disadvantages of ability grouping, the decline in student achievement as measured by standardized tests, the expansion of kindergarten…

This review summarizes pertinent literature on the differential impact of primary versus secondary public education on students. Data show that junior high/middle school students with prominent elementary school maladjustments have a 5-13-fold greater rate of grade failure, suspension, and undue absenteeism than do students without such…

Student promotion or retention is determined by various criteria: grades, student performance, competency tests, attendance records, and conduct. Representative court decisions bearing on each of the criteria are discussed, and guidelines for the development of promotion and retention policy are outlined. (MD)

This report provides information on the status of summer schools in New York City in 2000. The report describes: (1) "Planning and Management"; (2) "Student Information" (319,167 students were preregistered for summer school, and 87.9 percent of mandated students attended, compared to 64.4 percent the year before); (3)…