As we look ahead to Missouri’s 2027 legislative session, literacy reform is likely to be one of the top education issues. States like Mississippi and Louisiana have surged past Missouri on national reading assessments, particularly in the early grades. While these states have adopted several important reforms, two have been central to their success: improving literacy instruction and requiring students to demonstrate reading proficiency before advancing beyond the third grade.
Many states are considering whether to follow their path, including Missouri.
The retention component of these literacy policies is often controversial. Critics worry that it amounts to “punishing children.” But it is no kindness to promote a child through school who cannot read. Indeed, research shows that, at least in the early grades, retained students benefit tremendously in terms of on-grade academic performance when they are held back.
The debate also tends to focus narrowly on the students who are retained. However, new research in several states (including Michigan and Ohio) suggests that these policies produce broader benefits by affecting the much larger group of students who are ultimately promoted. This is because it turns out that students benefit from just the threat of retention, even if retention doesn’t actually occur.
Why? The answer is a bit uncomfortable: Weak reading skills alone do not seem to motivate schools and parents to make literacy a top priority. The possibility of retention, however, creates a clear incentive for everyone to intervene earlier and more intensively.
Writing on recent changes that weakened Ohio’s grade retention policy at the Fordham Institute’s Gadfly Daily, Vladimir Kogan provides a nice discussion of the value of the grade-retention threat. He writes: “Although much of the debate about retention laws has focused on impacts on students, the new evidence suggests that benefits come primarily from changing the behavior of two sets of adults—parents and educators.”
The evidence that early-grade retention can benefit retained students is already strong. This newly emerging evidence that these policies also improve outcomes for many students who are never retained only strengthens the case for reform.
Missouri lawmakers should consider such evidence as they consider literacy reform during the 2027 legislative session. During the 2026 session, they failed to pass literacy reform. Another year of inaction would mean that another cohort of children will pay the price for Missouri’s weak literacy policies.
