Global Education Digest 2012 - International Reading Association

SECTION 2 / Learning achievement: Differing policies and practices regarding grade repetition
Since 1999, the following countries reduced their
repetition rates by at least 10 percentage points
at the lower secondary education level: Eritrea,
Mozambique, Sao Tome and Principe, and Zambia.
However, there was a significant rise in rates in
Lesotho, Namibia and Togo over the same period.
In most cases, countries with high repetition rates at
the lower secondary level (over 20%) tend to have
rates exceeding 20% at the primary level, with the
exceptions of Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Niger, and
Sao Tome and Principe.
In general, boys are slightly more likely to repeat
lower secondary grades than girls in most countries
of sub-Saharan Africa. However, the gender gap
was significant in Burkina Faso, where 31% of boys
repeated a grade compared to 20% of girls in 2009,
as well as in Angola and Cape Verde (6 versus 5
percentage points respectively).
South and West Asia: Small signs of progress,
especially in Nepal and Bhutan
The South and West Asia region has the second
highest regional share – 28% – of the global
population of primary education repeaters. Across
the region, 9.1 million pupils at this education level
repeated a grade in 2009. The good news is that the
situation is improving, although at a slower rate than
in sub-Saharan Africa. Between 2000 and 2010, the
percentage of repeaters across the region remained
the same at about 5%, even though the number
of primary education pupils increased with rising
enrolment.
In contrast, repetition rates have increased in
Bangladesh (from 11% to 13%) and Pakistan (from
3% to 4%). This means that the number of children
repeating a primary grade has risen by about 0.5
million since 1999 in both countries combined.
Overall, in the region, boys and girls are just as likely
to repeat a grade of primary education.
At the lower secondary level, repetition rates have
been steadily falling in most countries in South and
West Asia since 1999. The largest decreases were
noticed in Bhutan (from 15% to 4%) and Iran (from
13% to 4%). In general, gender is not a major issue
affecting repetition rates.
Latin America and the Caribbean: Repetition
rates still high but some policy interventions
show promise
Repetition is also a major concern for the Latin
America and Caribbean region, which accounts
for 17% of the world’s primary education repeaters
(see Figure 11). Yet, once again, the situation has
been improving, with the regional percentage of
repeaters falling from 12% to 8% between 2000
and 2010. Unlike the previously described regions,
the absolute number of repeaters in Latin America
and the Caribbean has decreased from 8.4 million
to 5.4 million over the same period. While this is
partly due to a corresponding decline in primary
school enrolment, the significant drop in the number
of repeaters appears to reflect the success of
interventions designed to reduce repetition (which
are further discussed in Section 5).
As shown in Figure 10, repetition rates at the
primary education level decreased in four countries
in South and West Asia, with significant progress
made in Nepal, where the rates fell from 26% to
12% between 1999 and 2009, followed by Bhutan
(from 14% to 6%) and Iran (from 5% to 2%). In
India, a slight drop in the repetition rate (from 4.3%
to 3.5%) 5 has nevertheless led to a significant
drop in the number of pupils repeating a grade.
At the country level, repetition rates have fallen
since 1999 in most countries of the region. The
greatest progress has been made in Brazil, where
the rate fell from 24% to 18% 6 , and in Saint Vincent
and the Grenadines (10% to 4%). In contrast, there
has been a significant rise in the repetition rate in
Nicaragua, from 5% to 11%, as well as increases
of about 2 to 4 percentage points in the Bahamas,
5 The reference year is 2007.
6 The reference year is 2004.
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