Several students at the Alexandria school posted low reading scores last spring, putting them at risk of having to repeat third grade. The staff swooped in. They provided extra tutoring, targeted reading lessons and summer classes, all aimed at improving test scores enough for students to be promoted.
Ultimately, not a single third grader at Nachman was held back.
“It's hard work every day,” said Lori Robertson, the school’s literacy coach. “But we're seeing the fruits of our labor.”
A similar story unfolded across Louisiana last school year as a state law took effect requiring public school students to earn a minimum reading score to advance to fourth grade.
About 23% of third graders, or nearly 12,000 students, scored below the required reading level last spring. But fewer than 3% were ultimately held back, according to newly provided state data.
The data did not include the share of low-scoring students who were promoted to fourth grade after receiving exemptions, which are allowed for new English learners and for students with dyslexia or other disabilities. Superintendents in several school districts said that half or more of third graders at risk of being held back qualified for exemptions.
Other students, like those at Nachman, were able to improve their scores on the reading test, called DIBELS, after receiving additional instruction. The law, which does not apply to charter schools, allows students to retake the test twice.
About 2.7% of third graders remained “well below” the target reading level on DIBELS, indicating they are at high risk of reading difficulties, and did not qualify for exemptions. The law required those nearly 1,400 students to repeat third grade, and to be screened for dyslexia and receive extra reading help.
Proponents of the 2023 law, known as Act 422, say it spurred schools to ramp up support for struggling third graders rather than promote them to the next grade with big holes in their reading skills.
Jenna Chiasson, the Louisiana Department of Education’s deputy superintendent of teaching and learning, said the goal was always to direct more attention and resources to struggling readers, not to hold more students back.
“To us, this law has not been about retaining students,” she said, “but about how do we give students what they need in order for them to be successful.”
High Stakes and Extra Help
Louisiana is one of 18 states where struggling readers can be required to repeat third grade.
Louisiana’s law was part of sweeping literacy reforms that also included training teachers in the phonics-based “science of reading” and using frequent reading assessments to flag students who need extra help. The changes have been credited with fueling the recent rise in Louisiana students’ reading scores, which predated the third grade law.
Many of the reforms, including the third grade law, were modeled on literacy policies in Mississippi that led to big reading improvements.
“When you looked at states that had made significant gains in literacy, this third-grade ‘gate’ kind of focused everybody's attention — the students, the parents, the teachers, the systems — on really achieving those goals,” said Richard Nelson, the president of Louisiana’s community college system, who as a state legislator introduced the third grade bill.
The relatively small share of Louisiana third graders who were held back last year is in line with other states that also allow students to retake the reading test and exempt certain students, including those with disabilities. For example, 60% of third graders in Tennessee were flagged for retention in 2024 due to low reading scores, but only 1.2% were held back.
The laws aim to give students more time to master essential reading skills. Proponents cite research showing that students who can't read proficiently by the end of third grade are less likely to graduate from high school.
Still, critics say that students who are held back can face bullying or behavior issues and argue that there are less disruptive ways to support struggling readers.
Pros and Cons
It remains to be seen whether Louisiana’s students will benefit from another year of third grade, a pivotal time for literacy development after which students are expected to be proficient readers.
Researchers have been studying the impact of requiring students to repeat a grade since Florida became the first state to adopt such a policy more than 20 years ago. Most of the studies find that students’ reading scores improve in the years after they are retained.
One reason is the extra support — such as intensive tutoring or summer school — that states typically require schools to provide struggling readers even if they aren’t held back. In Michigan, where fewer than 1% of third graders were retained, researchers at the University of Michigan found that students’ scores still improved even if they were promoted to fourth grade.
“The additional support that students received the following year was probably a bigger driver of reading gains than actually being retained in third grade,” said Jordy Berne, a co-author of the study who now is an associate economist at RAND.
The laws’ long-term impacts are more ambiguous.
A 2017 study found that fourth grade boys who were held back under Louisiana’s earlier test-based promotion policy faced higher odds of dropping out of school. And a 2025 study found that Texas’ third-grade retention policy made students more likely to miss class and less likely to complete high school, possibly due to “stigma and disengagement” related to being held back.
“It’s a policy with pros and cons,” Berne said.
At Nachman Elementary School in Rapides Parish, staffers are working hard to keep any of this year’s third graders from being held back, said Robertson. Students with low mid-year DIBELS scores get daily tutoring and lessons tailored to the gaps in their reading skills.
Robertson credited the reading law with setting a clear goal, which families, educators and district officials have rallied around.
“We're showing that with all of this intense support,” she said, “students are achieving.”
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