Does grade retention affect achievement? Some evidence from Pisa

J. Ignacio García-Pérez, Marisa Hidalgo-Hidalgo and J. Antonio Robles-Zurita
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J. Ignacio García-Pérez: Universidad Pablo de Olavide
J. Antonio Robles-Zurita: Universidad Pablo de Olavide
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: J. Ignacio García Pérez ()

No 2011/37, Working Papers from Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB)

Abstract: Grade retention practices are at the forefront of the educational debate. In this paper, we use PISA 2009 data for Spain to measure the effect of grade retention on students’achievement. One important problem when analyzing this question is that school outcomes and the propensity to repeat a grade are likely to be determined simultaneously. We address this problem by estimating a Switching Regression Model. We find that grade retention has a negative impact on educational outcomes, but we confirm the importance of endogenous selection, which makes observed differences between repeaters and non-repeaters appear 14.6% lower than they actually are. The effect on PISA scores of repeating is much smaller (-10% of non-repeaters’average) than the counterfactual reduction that non-repeaters would suffer had they been retained as repeaters (-24% of their average). Furthermore, those who repeated a grade during primary education suffered more than those who repeated a grade of secondary school, although the effect of repeating at both times is, as expected, much larger.

Keywords: Grade retention; educational scores; PISA (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D63 I28 J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 42 pages
Date: 2011
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Working Paper: Does grade retention affect achievement? Some evidence from PISA (2011)
Working Paper: Does grade retention affect achievement? Some evidence from PISA (2011)
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