[CGMthrowaway]

>Their solution is that you must read at a 3rd grade level in order to get promoted to 4th grade

Can someone explain why we ever stopped doing that? It does seem like a lot of public school advocates these days push simply for graduate rate, to the exclusion of meeting common sense aptitude standards. To the point where it is having a downstream effect on universities having to tie up an unreasonable amount of resources on remedial education

[gwbas1c]

> Can someone explain why we ever stopped doing that?

Talk to someone educated in the 1950s and 1960s and you'll understand. There was always one or two kids in the class who were 2-3 years older than everyone else, because they frequently had to repeat grades. It caused a problem for them because they weren't with their peers, age-wise. (As opposed to the kid who was born too close to the cut-off and held back a year because they were just too young to start school.)

When I was in school, (1980s and 1990s,) sometimes kids who fell behind had to go to summer programs to catch-up. But, I was sent to private schools; children with special needs were sent to public schools that head the resources to handle them, and everyone was either from a financially stable family or otherwise knew the strings to pull to keep the kids in private school.

[CGMthrowaway]

I knew kids in public school that were held back a year. Never more than one, or if two they would go to some other school.

I also went to private school. There, it was clear that every student was expected to advance every year, but that each had to also truly meet the standard to advance. No teacher would let you fall behind, and any and all actions needed were taken. I see this as the #1 benefit of private school, to be honest - if a student does not succeed, the teachers do not get paid (you pull your kid from the school)

[ch4s3]

My understanding is that almost none of the kids falling under new retention laws are being held back more than twice and very few more than once. Most of these laws also mandate evidence based literacy instruction which are far more effective than what has been the norm for many years.

[clarionbell]

From what I understand, in USA schools are accountable, and funded, locally. This puts more direct pressure on educators not to fail children.

Recently, there has also been a movement to drop standards based grading and advanced classes, under guise of equity. That I find more troubling.

[andsoitis]

> Can someone explain why we ever stopped doing that?

big picture... people avoid telling others what their gaps are, where they're underperforming.

this empathy ruins people and, while it avoids difficult conversations, doesn't do the kid any favors. it is actually very unkind to the individual while the messenger protects their own comfort.

this pattern repeats it self in adulthood too.

[kotaKat]

“No child left behind”.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act

[prodigycorp]

Iirc Obama era policies actually made things worse. There was a plain English episode about it.

To my recollection, the gist of it was that although no child left behind forced administrators to overly index to a certain set of grades, the loosening of it led to the meaninglessness of grades entirely. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/plain-english-with-der...

[CGMthrowaway]

Can you elaborate? The wiki says NCLB is "outcomes based education" which is further defined as "By the end of the educational experience, each student should have achieved the goal." You seem to be suggesting it's the opposite though?

[ergonaught]

1) "Good idea, terrible implementation". Wrong incentives.

2) "They know the letter of the law, but not the spirit." No common shared understanding of the purpose/point/value motivations.

3) "Time marches on." There is a constant influx of new kids to educate and you can't realistically block the flow without rupturing something.

[orwin]

My country did the same. The answer is simple. Education research. Being one year behind isn't a big deal (and use not to be), but having a few 10-11 yo in the same class as 8 yo was detrimental to everyone. We then created special classes for people with learning disabilities, which is still detrimental to those kids, but at least the impact is limited.

Academic prowess shouldn't be such a social booster/crusher, especially pre-PhD, but it is, so we have to deal with it, and that mean not making kids repeat classes too much (two decade ago, it was max a year below 11, max two after that in my country, nowadays it's just avoided as much as possible).