One essential aspect of the so-called “science of reading” is the policy of “retaining” (flunking) students in third grade who do not pass the mandatory third-grade test to enter fourth grade.
Retaining low-scoring students boosts fourth grade scores. The students who are held back to repeat third grade may see a rise in their reading scores, but there are likely to experience harmful long-term consequences.
Steve Hinnefeld of the blog School Matters reports on a study that documents the long-term effects of retention.
He writes about a study by an economist at the University of Miami:
The study’s author, Jiee Zhong, found that academic gains from retention fade over time, and the practice “increases absenteeism, violent behavior, and juvenile crime, and reduces the likelihood of high school graduation.” Analyzing data on Texas students, Zhong found that being retained was tied to a 19% reduction in earnings at age 26.
Other studies have reached the same conclusion.
Teacher-blogger Nancy Bailey has suggested alternatives to retention that help children and don’t hurt them, like tutoring, smaller class size, summer school, small group instruction, looping two classes with the same teacher, a mixed-grade class, and assistance with resource classes. Bailey cited Melissa Roderick of the University of Chicago, who wrote in 1995: “The permanency of retention and the message it sends students may have long-term effects on self-esteem and school attachment that may override even short-term academic benefits.”
Hinnefeld writes:
Indiana started giving its third-grade standardized reading test in 2012 as part of a wave of “reforms” that also included private-school vouchers and expansion of charter schools. Initially, schools were told to retain students who didn’t pass the test; for a few years, they did. But they gradually returned to the previous approach: Teachers and families consulted to decide if it was in a student’s best interest to be promoted.
From 2017 to 2024, few third-graders were retained, even if they didn’t pass IREAD-3. Then state officials decided once again to get tough. The legislature voted in 2024 to require students to pass the test to be promoted, with “good cause” exceptions for some special education students and English learners. Indiana became one of 26 states to tie retention to tests, according to the Education Commission of the States.
The good news: Hoosier third-graders did better than anticipated. In 2025, the first year of mandatory retention, 87.3% passed IREAD-3, up from 82.5% the previous year. Statewide, just over 3,000 students had to repeat third grade.
State education officials took credit for the improvement, attributing it to Indiana’s emphasis on the “science of reading,” along with increased state and foundation funding. Students also have more opportunities to pass the test: They take it at the end of second grade, at the end of third grade, and, if they don’t pass, during the following summer. (There are no penalties for second-graders who don’t pass).
It’s also likely that teachers are more focused on ensuring that students pass IREAD-3, knowing there will be serious consequences if they don’t. They also would have worked to ensure students receive good-cause exceptions if they qualified. The number of Indiana students with exceptions increased by almost half between 2024 and 2025.
Teachers and families, for the most part, understand that holding kids back should be a last resort. Zhong’s study puts data behind what they know intuitively.
Indiana, like the other 25 states that follow this testcentric, anti-child policy must decide what matters most: test scores or the well-being of students.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Argue with Nancy Bailey at risk of being demonstrably wrong.
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Thanks for this update. In Ohio, our Gov. DeWine keeps talking up the so-called “science” of reading–which is actually a pseudo-science. (He, I believe, attended private, religious schools). I’m no expert, but I taught reading to struggling jr. high kids in Columbus in the ’60’s. I gave up my conference period to work with a group of reading strugglers. What I found that worked best was motivation. With one group, I had them bring in stuff like bicycle manuals to “interpret.” (We also had a bicycle in the room). I also visited a few of their homes and found few books, and adults who didn’t read much.
When I headed the collective bargaining program for CEA in the 1970’s, I had a big meeting of all reading teachers and lower-grade teachers to ask them–the actual experts–what they thought. They said, almost unanimously, lower class size in the lower grades. We were later able to do some of that at the bargaining table. It was an expensive solution–requiring some extra staff, but once the school board bought it, we never went back.
The whole test-and-drill movement has been a disaster. It’s really drill and kill. I’d like to see comparisons of the adult reading habits of those who suffered through the drill and kill, versus those who had more holistic education. That movement was based in part on a book entitled, “Why Johnny Can’t Read.” It was full of invalid contentions comparing American test scores with schools around the world. Later research showed that some of the reasons other nations had higher test scores included lower class sizes there and more holistic methods–like those we were leaving behind.
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