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Standards

Fall 1999 (v3#4)

The Cost of Grade Retention

To date, press reports on the cost of implementing a new promotion policy focus on the cost of mandatory summer school programs. In June, the Board of Education projected costs for its 1999 mandatory summer school program for grades 3, 6 and 8 at $46.4 million (BOR Memorandum No.1) and then set aside another $9 million for 4th graders. The actual expenditures for this year's program, which served approximately 35,000 students, are not yet known. Next year, due to the raising of the cutoff score for passing from the 15th to 20th percentile and expansion of the program to encompass grades 3 through 12, the mandatory summer school program may grow to serve as many as 300-360,000 students, at a cost that could run into the hundreds of millions.

However, the cost of summer school is only part of the story. Grade retention, i.e. holding students back to repeat a grade, has a price tag, too. Presuming that students held back make it to graduation, the school system must absorb the cost of an extra year of schooling for every child left back. In 1997-98, the latest year for which data is available, the cost for direct classroom instruction, food and transportation (leaving out all other administrative, building and support services) was $5,135 per pupil. Because of the CTB testing snafu, we don't know yet how many students will ultimately be held over this year. Using next year’s program projections of more than 300,000 students, we can estimate that as many as one-third, or 100,000 students might be left back (based on this year's experience). 100,000 X $5,135 = $513.5 million! This is a conservative estimate since the per-pupil cost next year is almost certain to be higher than that for 1997-98.

Of course, if students held back wind up dropping out before graduation, which research on grade retention suggests they are likely to do, the school system doesn't bear this "extra"cost for them, unless they've attended for more than the usual 13 years (K-12). However, dropouts pose other financial burdens for society: lower lifetime earnings, hence less taxes contributed; higher likelihood of welfare, food stamp or other social service costs; and a much greater chance of landing in prison at a cost of $70,000 - $100,000 or more annually.

Moreover, the cost of prevention programs, such as pre-K and class size reduction, and early intervention, such as after-school and Saturday programs, whose aim is to provide assistance to at-risk students before they fail, are not only less expensive financially but also far less costly in terms of the human and social toll.

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