Work In Progress

Holding Back Retention: The Effect of Learning Cycles on Enrollment and Student Achievement in Brazil

It is unclear whether repeating a grade has positive effects on student outcomes. In countries with high levels of repetition, it is particularly relevant to understand the causal effects of retention on dropout behavior and student achievement to improve the design of these policies. To this end, I evaluate a new retention policy design progressively implemented between 2013 and 2018 in schools in Distrito Federal, Brazil. The learning cycles policy restructures school organization so students can only be retained in four grades throughout primary and lower secondary school. Using school-level data, I estimate the dynamic causal effects of the policy on enrollment and test scores following an event-study difference-in-differences empirical strategy. I find that learning cycles increase enrollment in lower secondary by 9-12% on average while also having significant average negative effects on Portuguese test scores and no significant effects on math scores. These findings suggest there is a trade-off: relaxing retention can have a positive impact in reducing dropout, albeit at the potential cost of lowering test scores.

Three Minute Presentation (Master SynThesis Competition Winner, Columbia University)

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