The Education Gadfly Weekly

Under pressure from public school groups, Ohio lawmakers last year gutted retention requirements that had been in place under the Third Grade Reading Guarantee. This was a setback in Ohio’s otherwise praiseworthy early literacy efforts, as retention—via the extra time and support it provides—has proven to benefit children struggling to acquire basic reading skills. Without a requirement, schools tend to resort to “social promotion,” a discredited practice that advances students to the next grade despite being unprepared for the work they’ll be asked to do.

The legislature did not outright scrap reading retention, but eviscerated it by adding a massive loophole. Under the new policy, schools may promote third graders with reading deficiencies if parents approve. We at Fordham expressed concerns that this would amount to little more than a checkbox exercise that largely entails collecting signatures from parents. The net effect would be the same as a retention-free policy, with overwhelming majorities of third graders being promoted to fourth grade.

The new policy went into effect starting in the 2023–24 school year. The results are, sad to say, as predicted. Across Ohio, virtually every third grader—regardless of reading skill—was promoted to fourth grade. Statewide, an astonishing 98.3 percent of third graders were promoted, and a large majority of districts reported universal third grade promotion rates.

Figure 1 shows that 409 out of 605 Ohio districts promoted 100 percent of third graders last year, while another 187 districts reported rates above 95 percent. Just nine districts reported rates below that mark, with Garfield Heights promoting the lowest percentage at 82 percent. This chart also shows the impact of rolling back the retention mandate. Grade promotion was significantly lower in 2018–19, the last year Ohio enforced third-grade reading retention. Results from the past two years,[1] however, show that social promotion returned en masse in the absence of a clear retention requirement.

Figure 1: Number of school districts by third-grade promotion rate, selected years

Of course, universal promotion would be perfectly acceptable if third graders were achieving reading proficiency across the board. But that’s not happening in most places. Table 1 displays fifteen districts with the largest discrepancies in their third-grade promotion versus proficiency rates. The largest gap is found in East Cleveland, where just 25 percent of third graders achieved reading proficiency last year, but 100 percent (!) were promoted to fourth grade. Jefferson Township near Dayton and Richmond Heights near Cleveland also promoted 100 percent of third graders, despite less than one-third demonstrating proficiency. Three of the Ohio Eight big-city districts—Toledo, Dayton, and Columbus—also appear on this list. All three promoted more than 97 percent of third graders, even though just two in five achieved reading proficiency.

Table 1: Districts with the largest gap in third-grade promotion versus proficiency rates, 2023–24

The next table takes a closer look at all of the Ohio Eight districts’ promotion and proficiency rates, ordered by the size of their gap. Alongside the trio of districts mentioned above, Canton, Akron, and Cincinnati also promoted nearly all third graders (more than 97 percent), despite posting proficiency rates between 47 and 58 percent. Meanwhile, Cleveland and Youngstown promoted 88 and 89 percent of third graders, two of the lowest rates in the state. To their credit, they put the brakes on advancing a relatively large handful of third graders, but still—given their low reading proficiency rates—this is nowhere near the number of students who need the extra time and support.

Table 2: Ohio Eight districts’ third-grade promotion versus proficiency rates, 2023–24

The reluctance of state policymakers and schools to retain students who need more help is deeply troubling. Children across Ohio, including places such as East Cleveland, Columbus, and Dayton, all need a strong reading foundation to tackle the more complex and challenging materials that come in middle and high school. Unfortunately, without a retention mandate, there is no longer a clear-cut assurance—a true “guarantee”—that they will receive the time and supports to become strong readers. When no one stops to intervene, research finds that students become frustrated and many of them decide school isn’t worth it and drop out.

Ohio can’t turn a blind eye to reading deficiencies and social promotion. To be sure, the state is taking positive steps forward in moving schools toward evidence-based instruction known as the science of reading. If implemented well, this effort should increase reading achievement and reduce the need for interventions over the long haul. But after yet another year of system-wide social promotion and too many students falling short of reading proficiency, it’s time for Ohio policymakers to reinstate the third grade retention requirement. 

The Economist recently made the case that the United States economy is the envy of the world. American workers are exceptionally productive and innovative, and the corresponding increase in personal income and economic growth leaves “other rich countries in the dust.” Some education experts find this continued economic exceptionalism surprising because our students, on average, underperform on international tests.[1] But comparing average student test scores across countries obscures just how much cognitive ability the U.S. labor force possesses. Similarly, comparing average test scores across U.S. states masks the considerable talent in Ohio. That said, whereas the U.S. appears to put its talent to good use, Ohio struggles to retain its high achievers.

Harvard professor Paul Peterson and his colleagues (including Hoover Institution fellow Eric Hanushek) released an analysis in 2011 that illustrates just how variable student achievement is across the United States. They examined the test scores of U.S. eighth graders in 2007 (students who are helping to drive today’s economy) and compared them to the test scores of students across sixty-five countries participating in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA).[2] The U.S., on average, found itself near the middle of the pack in terms of its proficiency rates—on par with the U.K. and Italy in math—but states like Massachusetts, Minnesota, Vermont, and North Dakota stacked up quite well internationally. In math, Massachusetts ranked just ahead of Japan and Canada, and only six countries ranked higher (Singapore, South Korea, Finland, Taiwan, Liechtenstein, and Switzerland). Several U.S. states found themselves near the top in reading proficiency rates. Ohio wasn’t among the very highest-performing states, but still only eight countries significantly outperformed it in reading. When focusing only on average scores nationwide, we lose sight of states where students compete with the highest performers internationally.

Comparing average test scores across states similarly obscures variation within them. Ohio’s average eighth grade test scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) put it among the top twenty U.S. states in math and the top ten states in reading (both pre- and post-pandemic), but those respectable rankings obscure variation among Ohio students. For example, consider differences between students who are and are not eligible for free or reduced-price lunches (FRPL). Although Ohio ranks in the middle of the pack in terms of the math and reading achievement of its FRPL students, in both 2019 and 2022 Ohio ranked in the top ten for the achievement of its non-FRPL students. Indeed, Ohio may very well be in the top five—as it was in 2019 for both reading and math—due to our students’ impressive post-pandemic recovery in reading since 2022. (We’ll know more next calendar year, when the next round of NAEP results is released.)

Table 1. Ohio’s rank among U.S. states on eighth grade NAEP

That the performance of Ohio’s economically disadvantaged students roughly tracks the national average is concerning. Indeed, the decline in Ohio’s average student achievement prior to the pandemic was driven entirely by Ohio’s economically disadvantaged students. As the figure below reveals, between 2013 and 2019, the achievement of non-FRPL students increased from 301 to 302, whereas the achievement of FRPL students declined 9 points, from 274 to 265 points. The results are similar for reading.

Figure 1. Math scale scores, eighth grade NAEP, U.S. and Ohio, by eligibility for FRPL

The precipitous decline in economically disadvantaged students’ basic skills threatens their futures, as the returns to numeracy skills are especially large in the U.S. We must make sure all families have high-quality educational options, particularly in Ohio’s largest school districts, in order to improve economically disadvantaged students’ achievement.[3] My recent evidence-based suggestions for addressing these test score declines, and Ohio’s current efforts to address chronic absenteeism, should go a long way toward reversing test score declines among these students.

Ohio’s large stock of high achievers

When it comes to the role of cognitive skills in driving economic growth, however, an important takeaway is that Ohio has a large stock of high-achieving students relative to other U.S. states. The roughly 50 percent of Ohio students who are not economically disadvantaged have, on average, remarkable levels of academic achievement in eighth grade—nearly on par with the highest-performing states of Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Washington, and just behind the national leader, New Jersey. Now consider the fact that Ohio is far larger. That means that Ohio is producing a large skilled labor force relative to other states. This is exactly the type of labor force that can help drive economic growth and the well-being of all Ohioans. Indeed, to the extent that the post-2012 achievement declines among economically disadvantaged students are due to out-of-school hardships following the Great Recession, promoting economic growth could itself be an important driver of future student achievement.

A top priority for Ohio policymakers should be talent retention. High-achieving Ohio students must be encouraged to obtain a college education in our state, as research indicates that students are likely to work where they attended college and that Ohio is a net exporter of four-year college graduates. That same research also indicates that those who attend selective colleges are most likely to leave their home state, which means the exodus from Ohio is even more consequential than the rates of out-of-state college attendance imply. Programs like the Governor’s Merit Scholarship for top Ohio students are a potentially important step in trying to retain Ohio’s impressive pool of skilled labor. Continuing to improve the state’s K–12 schools, paired with a focus on retaining Ohio’s remarkably high-achieving students, is a recipe for a bright future for all Ohioans.

Last year, Ohio policymakers established a statewide science of reading initiative. And this year, that initiative is well underway. Districts and schools are required to use curricula and materials that appear on the state-approved list of high-quality options. Thousands of teachers and administrators are participating in mandated professional development. And in 115 schools and districts, reading coaches are providing intensive support to school staff.

These are promising, evidence-based developments that should give families and advocates hope for improved student outcomes. In a previous piece, I cautioned that it will take time for those outcomes to materialize. But time isn’t the only key to an early literacy turnaround. Faithful implementation matters, too. And thanks to the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE), Ohio’s implementation efforts just received a significant boost.

On October 18, Governor DeWine announced that Ohio had been awarded a $60 million Comprehensive Literacy State Development grant (CLSD). According to USDOE, the purpose of these discretionary grants is to “create a comprehensive literacy program to advance literacy skills, including pre-literacy skills, reading, and writing.” Funds can be spent on children from birth through twelfth grade, and should prioritize traditionally underserved groups like economically disadvantaged students, English language learners, and children with disabilities.

Ohio was among twenty-three grant awardees, and received the second-highest amount of funding. As part of the grant, early childhood education programs and pre-, elementary, middle, and high schools will be able to apply to the Department of Education and Workforce (DEW) to become comprehensive literacy implementation sites. Local education agencies (LEAs) that are located in the same region and plan to collaborate and share resources are permitted to apply as partnerships. Subgrants will be awarded in four age groups: birth to kindergarten, grades K–5, grades 6–8, and grades 9–12. DEW plans to issue a request for applications for K–12 subgrants in early 2025, with awardees announced in late spring. Subgrants for birth to kindergarten will occur separately and later.

If selected—the process is competitive—sites must use their grant funds to strengthen the way teachers and administrators are implementing the state’s science of reading initiative. The governor’s media release provided several ideas. For example, sites can offer coaching for teachers and principals on how to bring the science of reading into classrooms. Although the state is already funding reading coaches in more than 100 schools, Ohio is home to thousands of schools. There’s no shortage of places that don’t currently have a coach but would benefit from one. These federal funds can help with that.

Sites can also provide staff with training on best practices for the use of high-quality instructional materials. Teachers and administrators are already required to complete state-approved professional development by June 2025. But additional opportunities that go beyond the state-provided training would be beneficial. Moreover, hundreds of districts and charters weren’t using high-quality curricula or materials prior to the state’s science of reading initiative. That includes more than half of Ohio’s lowest-performing districts according to third-grade reading proficiency. Providing staff in these schools with additional training that’s specifically aligned with the new curriculum and materials they’ll be using could go a long way toward making teachers comfortable with this big change and bolstering their knowledge and skills.

It’s worth noting that this isn’t the first time Ohio has won a CLSD grant. In 2019, the state was awarded $42 million. That might be why DEW already has several resources available for applicants who are looking to boost their chances of being selected. Those resources include recommendations like administering the Reading-Tiered Fidelity Inventory (which can help identify areas of strength and opportunities for continuous improvement); writing or updating a local literacy plan (DEW requires all programs and LEAs applying for CLSD subgrants to complete a local literacy plan); and ensuring that building administrators have already completed professional development in the science of reading (applications for CLSD will be due before administrators are required to have completed training).

Over the next few years, there will undoubtedly be bumps on the implementation road. But this federal grant should help make the journey for some schools a lot smoother. Governor DeWine said it best: “This funding will further advance our efforts to make Ohio a model state, both in terms of how we support teachers with the training and tools they need to raise literacy achievement, and how we provide our students with the skills they need to be successful throughout life.”

About a month ago, I published an analysis of the starting salaries of teachers working in school districts across the Cleveland and Columbus metro areas. Strong entry-level pay is crucial as schools work to attract talented folks into the profession. We saw that these salaries, while not exceedingly lucrative, are solid, clocking in at roughly $45,000 to $50,000 per year, not including benefits. High-poverty districts such as Cleveland and Columbus pay above-average salaries, though I also discussed ways that they and other districts could further prioritize entry-level salary to attract teachers to their schools.

First-year pay is only the beginning, of course. Wage growth over time also matters to teachers, and impacts schools’ ability to retain effective instructors. When schools increase pay too little, they are more likely to see their educators head for the exits. More generous pay raises, on the other hand, increase the likelihood that teachers stay put.

Strong wage growth early in teachers’ careers is especially important, as attrition tends to be highest in those years. As Chad Aldeman has shown, roughly a third of U.S. teachers leave the profession by the end of their fifth year of teaching, and just over half exit by their tenth. A recent study from the RAND Corporation indicates that urban, high-poverty schools suffer more teacher attrition than in other locales. This amount of turnover contributes to educator shortages, creates more “churn” in schools’ staff, and represents a loss of talent developed during the beginning stages of teachers’ careers. While various factors explain why so many teachers exit early, some is surely related to dissatisfaction about pay.

But just what are the salaries of Ohio’s early-career teachers? Are they strong enough to keep teachers from leaving? This piece looks at the fifth- and tenth-year teacher salaries of districts in the Columbus metro area during the 2023–24 school year (though not discussed below, salary data for Cleveland area districts are available at this link). The focus is on teachers whose highest degree is a bachelor’s.

Figure 1 shows that the average fifth-year teacher salary in Franklin County was $57,000, which is about $10,000 higher than the average starting salary for these districts. Salaries vary, with Upper Arlington paying the highest wages, while New Albany-Plain pays the lowest at just over $50,000. Columbus City Schools pays its fifth-year teachers $55,487, just under the county average and a disappointingly small pay bump versus its first-year salary of $49,321.

Figure 1: Franklin County school district salaries for fifth-year teachers, FY 24

Figure 2 shows that the average tenth-year salary is nearly $69,000 per year, about $12,000 higher than the average fifth-year salary in Franklin County. This amount is right around the average teacher salary for all Ohio teachers. We again see some variation in tenth-year salaries with Worthington and Dublin paying nearly $75,000 and New Albany-Plain paying the lowest at just over $57,000. Columbus again falls just beneath the county average at $67,521.  

Figure 2: Franklin County school district salaries for tenth-year teachers, FY 24

Whether early-career teacher salaries between roughly $55,000 and $75,000 per year are good enough is certainly debatable. Some might see them as reasonably generous; after all, these wages are right around the median salary for an Ohio worker. Others will disagree. In fact, a recent op-ed in the Washington Post argued that every teacher in America—no matter their experience or effectiveness—should be paid at least $100,000 per year. That proposal would be incredibly expensive, at least at current student-teacher ratios, but calls to significantly raise teacher pay across the board have long been made by the unions and policymakers.

Most calls to boost teachers’ salaries, however, ignore a more basic structural problem with teacher pay, one that likely contributes to the high rates of turnover early in teachers’ careers and in high-poverty districts. That’s the longstanding practice—enshrined in Ohio law—of paying teachers according to “step and lane” salary schedules. This method starts first-year teachers at the bottom of the pay scale and provides incremental salary increases as they gain experience and/or earn a master’s degree. Figure 3 illustrates, using Columbus City Schools’ schedule.

Figure 3: Example of a teacher salary schedule

While there is a certain efficiency to this type of step-and-lane pay system, it also treats teachers like widgets rather than skilled professionals. That creates three specific problems, particularly in regard to early-career teachers.[1]

First, it makes it harder for schools to retain teachers. Districts can’t simply deviate from this schedule, even if they want to pay a particular teacher more in an effort to retain her. For example, an outstanding third-year math teacher might get an offer from another employer worth more than she is currently paid. District administrators cannot match that salary to keep her in the classroom. Why? Because they have to pay according to the salary schedule. Unfortunately, an early-career salary may not be enough to keep her on board.

Second, a rigid pay system fails to reward teachers who go the extra mile on behalf of students. If teachers know their salaries will increase at roughly $2,000 increments each year—no matter what—they have little incentive to go above and beyond. Highly effective teachers shouldn’t have to wait two decades to reach the higher salary echelons, but that’s what our current system does.

Third, this type compensation system doesn’t encourage teachers to remain in the toughest schools, most notably those located in high-poverty communities. Columbus City Schools, for example, likely loses a significant number of early-career teachers to other districts because it only offers modest pay raises each year. They bolt for jobs in the suburbs where the pay is higher and working conditions easier.

What to do? Within the conventional step-and-lane framework, districts could more heavily “frontload” teacher pay so that early-career teacher salaries escalate at a faster pace. For example, Columbus, a district where early-career salaries grow relatively slowly, might consider a schedule that provides faster pay raises early in teachers’ careers (or better yet, more specifically for high-performing, early-career teachers). This would help discourage its junior teachers from eyeing jobs in nearby districts, or seeking employment in other career fields.

A better solution is to give districts greater flexibility around pay, so they can compensate teachers in ways they believe best retain and reward employees. If a district wants to stick with the step-and-lane schedule, so be it. But bolder district leaders should also be allowed to experiment with alternative pay strategies, including ones that provide their early-career teachers with stronger financial incentives to remain in the classroom. This approach would require Ohio lawmakers to remove provisions that currently require districts to implement a salary schedule based on years of experience and degrees-earned.

For too long, schools have not provided the type of financial incentives needed to keep many of their talented young professionals in their classrooms. With some help from lawmakers, districts, including high-poverty urban districts, could be empowered to move to systems that pay teachers more strategically, and better ensure that every student in Ohio has an exceptional teacher leading their classroom.

The number of English learner (EL) students enrolled in public schools has grown substantially in the United States over the past two decades. How has this impacted non-EL students in those schools? New research aims to find out.

A group of RAND researchers take advantage of the fact that EL growth has recently occurred in many new communities unaccustomed to serving large numbers of EL students, which allows them to look at the impacts on a relatively clean slate. They chose the state of Delaware—whose share of ELs in public schools rose from 2 percent in 2000 (ranked 38th among all states) to 11 percent in 2019 (ranked 9th), outpacing all but South Carolina in the growth of this student population. And they analyze the school years 2015–16 through 2018–19. Student-level administrative data cover all students in grades four through eight, including their scores on state English language arts (ELA) and math test scores as well as their end-of-year summative assessments in those two subjects.

Students were sorted into five groups in each year of the study: new students, who entered public schools anywhere in the state during a given year; new ELs, who were identified as English learners in their first year of enrollment; existing students, who were previously enrolled at the start of a given year; existing current ELs, who were already in an EL program at the start of a given year; and existing former ELs, who were previously identified as English Learners but were classified out at any point during a given year. Since ELs are not randomly assigned to schools, the researchers leverage the within-school-year and across-grade variation in new EL concentration to study the effects of ELs on existing students. Because the main assignment criteria—student age—is the same for all pupils, focusing on grade bands hopefully lessens the influence of unobserved student characteristics. They also control for the effects of possible attrition among existing students who might leave in reaction to an influx of EL peers.

Overall, they find that a 5 percentage-point increase in new EL student share improved the ELA test scores of existing students in that grade level by 0.04 of a standard deviation (SD), which is statistically significant, and math scores by 0.02 SD, which is not. They found the strongest significant effects accruing to existing current ELs (improvements of 0.15 SD in ELA and math with a 5 percentage-point increase in new ELs) and former ELs (improvements of 0.08 SD in ELA and 0.012 SD in math). Other groups showed small but non-significant positive effects.

The researchers theorize that these impacts were caused mainly by a boost in classroom resources (teachers, aides, curricula, technology, etc.) deployed to support new EL arrivals, and which “spilled over” to their peers. They run dual analyses to show that the same spillover effects do not occur with an increase in the share of new non-EL students. However, this examination includes no specifics about changes in school funding amounts or spending categories, so their findings remain speculative. But their main point stands: Not only does an increase in the number of new English learner students not seem to harm the academic outcomes of current students in this context—regardless of EL status—it may even serve to increase outcomes almost across the board.

SOURCE: Sy Doan et al., “Educational Spillover Effects of New English Learners in a New Destination State,” Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis (October 2024).

The academic impacts of pre-kindergarten programming for children are a matter of unsettled science, with some research finding a positive impact, some a negative, and much showing the fade out of all impacts by third grade or soon thereafter. A new working paper by researchers from Brown and Yale adds to this literature by examining a universal preschool program in New Haven, Connecticut. But it also looks at a less-studied question: What about the economic impacts of this pre-K program? Specifically, how much workforce support does readily-accessible childcare provide for parents?

The New Haven program was established in the mid-1990s. Its current iteration, dating to 2003, includes separate programming for three-year-olds (PK3) and four-year-olds (PK4). It is free of charge, operates mostly in New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) elementary buildings, and is available to all Connecticut residents via open enrollment. The structure includes 6.5 hours of educational curricula, as well as wraparound care starting at 7:30 a.m. and ending at 5:30 p.m. five days per week during the school year. Both PK3 and PK4 are oversubscribed each year, so seats are assigned by lottery.

The researchers started with all applications submitted between 2003 through 2022, including full data from students’ applications, the administrative rules and student priorities used to process the applications, and school placement outcomes. They observed 18,795 applications from 16,037 individuals. Just under 42 percent of applicants were Black, and 28.5 percent were Hispanic. Forty-eight percent applied to PK4, and 52 percent to PK3. The median household income of applicants was $59,708. And just over 26 percent of applicants ultimately enrolled their children in a pre-K program each year on average.

The report’s findings on academic outcomes focus on standardized test scores for students in grades three through eight, chronic absenteeism, and grade retention. To do that, all pre-K applicants were linked with NHPS records to track their academic outcomes over time. Those who went on to attend public schools anywhere in Connecticut were linked to enrollment and outcome records by the Connecticut State Department of Education. These data cover the years 2006 through 2022. A majority of pre-K applicants were tracked through middle school, many into high school and beyond.

All academic outcome impacts were null or slightly negative, with enrolled and non-enrolled pre-K applicants showing no statistically significant difference in outcomes. This was true across the board. The researchers surmise that these findings are likely due to a combination of rapid effect fadeout and parents of non-enrolled children finding other pre-K programming of similar quality.

The impacts on parental income, however, are another story. Workforce data came from the Connecticut Department of Labor, linked to parental records submitted during the pre-K application process. These were further linked to Connecticut Unemployment Insurance records and ultimately cover the years 1999 through 2022. All earnings figures were reported in terms of 2015 dollars. Administrative data were supplemented by parental survey responses from 840 pre-K applicants. It’s a small number, considering the time span of the analysis, but is positive in that they have responses from applicants in every year, even if the earliest years are more sparsely covered.

The researchers find that enrollment in the pre-K program increased childcare coverage by eleven hours per week, on average. As a result, parents of pre-K enrollees worked an average of twelve more hours per week, and their earnings increased by 21.7 percent in the year following application, as compared to parents who applied but did not enroll their children. Both administrative and survey data showed high baseline rates of labor force participation among applicants and little evidence that children’s enrollment raised these rates further. Put simply: Most parents applying for the pre-K spots were already working and looking to pre-K for support to continue, rather than trying to use pre-K to get into the labor force.

As a labor market policy, New Haven’s pre-K program is a boon. It’s pricey, yes—$15,500 per child per year (in 2015 dollars)—but each dollar of net government expenditure on this program yielded $5.51 in after-tax benefits for families, almost entirely from parents’ earnings gains, which persist for at least six years after the end of pre-K. The researchers note that this is a large return on investment compared to other labor market policies they examined. As an education policy, the picture is far less rosy. For each dollar of net government spending, education benefits were only $0.46 to $1.32. Even children’s health interventions analyzed by other researchers (such as expanding affordable health insurance for children) have been shown to generate better education returns than that.

In the end, these and other findings suggest that the academic dimension of pre-K programs may be best ignored as a value proposition (or simply accepted as having null value long-term) in favor of their workforce dimension. That doesn’t mean a lowering of quality or shuttering of programs, but simply an admission, hard as it may be, that accessible pre-K is a work support for grown-ups rather than a kindergarten training ground for kiddos. It certainly seems that working families in New Haven view them as such, and the families who were able to access pre-K placement took full advantage of the opportunity. Such a change in mindset could allow new versions of pre-K—perhaps more connected to business than to schools—and new funding sources than the public school/government-funded model that currently predominates.

SOURCE: John Eric Humphries et al., “Parents’ Earnings and the Returns to Universal Pre-Kindergarten,” NBER Working Papers (October 2024).

Following Florida’s lead, about twenty states, including Ohio, have enacted laws that require schools to retain third graders who are struggling to read and provide intensive interventions that help them catch up. The basic idea is this: Students with serious reading deficiencies need more time and support to develop the literacy skills required for middle and high school–level work. But without a statewide requirement, there is no guarantee that schools will step in at this critical juncture and offer extra help. Instead, they’ll likely default to “social promotion,” a practice that passes students along even though they are poor readers.

Despite the commonsense nature of this approach, third grade retention policies have been hotly debated in Ohio. Critics often claim that retention harms students who have to repeat third grade. But the evidence to support this claim is thin—and growing flimsier by the day. In fact, we now have four rigorous analyses of states’ retention provisions that say exactly the opposite: Struggling students benefit when schools are required to retain and provide them with more support before promotion to fourth grade.

Let’s first recap the studies from three other states with third grade retention policies similar to Ohio. All of these analyses rely on a rigorous empirical method that allows for apples-to-apples comparisons of retained versus extremely similar non-retained pupils who just narrowly pass the promotional bar. This method provides strong causal evidence on the effect of retention (as opposed to social promotion).

• In Florida, retained students make significant achievement gains on state exams through middle school. In high school, they post higher GPAs and are less likely to need remedial coursework.

• In Indiana, retained students make significant achievement gains on state exams scores through seventh grade. No effect was found on attendance or discipline, perhaps alleviating concerns about behavioral impacts.

• In Mississippi, retained students make remarkable gains on state exams through sixth grade that are equivalent to approximately 40 percentile points above their non-retained peers.

What about Ohio? A new study, commissioned by Ohio Excels and conducted by professors at the Ohio Education Research Center at Ohio State, finds strikingly similar results. Starting in 2013–14, about 3 to 4 percent of Ohio third graders have been retained under the Third Grade Reading Guarantee.[1] Following the same methodology as the studies above, the Ohio analysis focuses on the first two cohorts of third graders who were subject to the guarantee policy and tracks their state exam results through seventh grade.

The positive effects of retention are substantial for students who repeated third grade. In fourth and fifth grade, retained students outperform their closely matched peers by approximately twenty to forty scaled-score points—equivalent to roughly one achievement level—on state math and reading exams. The academic gains for retained students persist and remain significant into sixth and seventh grade, though the size of the impact moderates to a ten- to twenty-point advantage. Much as good elementary schools are needed to fully capitalize on preschool, this suggests that some extra support remains important as retained pupils progress through higher grades. Overall, these results show that retention provides a big lift for thousands of Ohio’s struggling readers and helps put them on surer pathways in middle and high school.

Because literacy is so essential to lifelong success, elementary schools have no greater responsibility than ensuring that children can read fluently. Fortunately, state leaders have understood this. Former Governor Kasich recognized the importance of reading by grade three when he signed the Guarantee, saying, “Kids who make their way through social promotion beyond the third grade, when they get up to the eighth, ninth, tenth grade...they get lapped, the material becomes too difficult.” Last week, former U.S. congressman and president of the Ohio Business Roundtable Pat Tiberi said, “There's no more significant benchmark in education than ensuring that students are proficient readers before they leave elementary school.” Earlier this year, Governor Mike DeWine called fully educating students a “moral imperative” and noted that “the earlier a child is reading on grade level, the better that child will do in later grades—and in life.”

Ensuring children can read is indeed a moral imperative. There’s wisdom in giving struggling readers more time and support to strengthen their literacy skills, and research confirms it. It would be reckless for lawmakers to backtrack on retention, as some have proposed, especially as Ohio seeks to get even more serious about early literacy through its praiseworthy science of reading initiatives. Instead, they should stay the course on retention and make certain—truly “guarantee”—that all children read well before they enter fourth grade.