[Tax-chick]

Repeating a year in high school is much better than a social promotion.

Repeating a year in elementary school is even better, if the student can read and add at the end of the second year. (Ideally, they'd have learned the first year ...)

Our local school districts are trying to bring up high school test scores, especially for minorities, but there's only so much you can do with teenagers who can't read well. They've got to put the effort into basic literacy and math.

[george76]

Social promotion at any grade level is a huge disservice. Holding a kid back to learn how to read, write, do math...is a real service to the kid and to society.

The kid and the parents may freak out now, but it is for the best for their and our futures.

Learning english early is also very important.

[LibertarianLiz]

but there's only so much you can do with teenagers who can't read well.

This is exactly right. If you can't read well, and comprehend what you are reading, you really can't do well in any other subject. Also, if the middle-school or high schooler is not doing well in math, it is because they never truly learned the basics.

Trying to fix it in high school is too late. The problems we are seeing, are problems at the elementary school level. Yet, so few people seem to understand this.