University of Twente Student Theses
A formative evaluation of an alternative approach to grade retention and promotion decisions: justification and experiences
Vehof, C.B.M. (2024) A formative evaluation of an alternative approach to grade retention and promotion decisions: justification and experiences.
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| Abstract: | Grade retention has been used for many years in to enhance low achievers’ academic performance but does not always have the intended effects. The decisions for grade retention and promotion, depend on whether students meet the school’s promotion and retention criteria. These decisions are usually based on different data but involve subjective judgments based on intuition by teachers, which makes these decisions subjective and probably biased. As grade retention often does not have the intended effects, and decisions for grade retention and promotion are often biased due to subjectivity, evidence-based alternatives needed to be investigated. This study aimed to evaluate a Toolkit developed by a Dutch secondary school, intended to let teachers take a broader perspective than just grades or academic performance in making promotion and retention decisions. A qualitative formative evaluation was used and a document analysis, literature review and several interviews were done and conducted. The findings suggested that the developers of this alternative Promising Promotion Toolkit were inspired by ideas from the scientific literature, but no sources used for developing and designing the Toolkit were documented. This makes it difficult to draw substantiated conclusions about the theoretical justification. The results showed that the different elements of the designed Toolkit align with the theoretical justification as presented in this study. Nevertheless, there was limited information regarding how grade retention and promotion decisions are made, and it should be noticed that the different criteria related to non-academic achievements are usually discussed in descriptive studies. That makes that these criteria still lack clear scientific evidence and explanation for their use in the grade retention and promotion decision-making process. Teachers could use the different elements of the designed Toolkit as a basis for making better-informed grade retention and promotion decisions, but they should be aware of the cautions that the different elements have. The findings suggest that the working process, as explained in the Promising Promotion Toolkit, partially corresponds to practice. The users experienced the intentions and the idea of the Toolkit positively, but there are still some improvements to be made, as the Toolkit’s implementation was not optimal. This limited implementation made it difficult to draw conclusions about the use of the Toolkit in practice and the experiences regarding it. Further research should investigate, evaluate, and review the implementation of this Toolkit. In addition, further research should investigate more evidence-based alternatives to grade retention and investigate which criteria and components could be used to make better-informed and justified grade retention and promotion decisions. |
| Item Type: | Essay (Master) |
| Faculty: | BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences |
| Subject: | 81 education, teaching |
| Programme: | Educational Science and Technology MSc (60023) |
| Link to this item: | https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/99897 |
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