Grade retention is a very difficult and emotionally charged decision. It may be considered when students: Have significant struggles making progress in reading, writing or math. The students fail to reach performance levels expected for promotion to the next grade. They appears to be "immature" and "young" for their age. In many schools, tests are being used to determine whether a child will go on to the next grade or repeat the same grade. With the current push for high educational standards, more and more kids are facing the possibility of retention because they're not achieving test scores required for promotion. Retention is viewed as a way to ensure greater accountability — to guarantee the school is doing its job. In some cases, it's the new "get tough" policy to stop or reduce "social promotion" — automatically passing a child on to the next grade at the end of each school year.
Grade retention or grade repetition is the process of having a student repeat an educational course, usually one previously failed. Students who repeat a course are referred as "repeaters". Repeaters can be referred to as having been "held back". The primary alternative to grade retention (for those who have failed) is a policy of social promotion, under the ideological principle that staying with their same-age peers is important. Social promotion is the promotion of all students, regardless of achievement, from one class to the next. Social promotion is somewhat more accepted in countries which use tracking to group students according to academic ability. Regardless of whether a failing student is retained or promoted, academic scholars believe that underperformance must be addressed with intensive remedial help, such as summer school programs.