When kids fall behind and have to repeat a grade, they can wind up in a vicious cycle of peer judgment and low self-esteem. “We are ending up with something now called the ninth-grade bulge,” explains Zaff, “which means a glut of students who have to repeat the grade. So they are stigmatized socially as well as academically, which can also lead to their finding it easier to just give up.”

While she doesn't deny that the ninth grade is a pivotal moment in a student’s education , Diane Ravitch, author of Reign of Error, has her suspicions about the motivations behind schools’ growing interest in ninth-grade performance. "Many schools allow students to advance ready or not, and when they reach the ninth the stakes are higher. The high-stakes testing starts in the tenth grade so kids are being held back not for their own sake but to protect their school’s statistics. If the focus were really on the students, people would be thinking creatively about how to help them instead of thinking if them as data points."

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Educators are honing in on three indicators—attendance, behavior, and course performance—that are believed to be the most accurate measurements of a student’s likelihood to either quit school or move on. A lengthy, detailed guide from the National High School Center states that “more students fail ninth grade than any other grade in high school, and a disproportionate number of students who are held back in ninth grade subsequently drop out.” The guide describes telltale signs that can be detected as early as the first semester of the first year in high school: The biggest risk factor for failing ninth, for example, is the number of absences during the first 30 days. Missing more than 10 percent is cause for concern. In addition, first-year high-school students are classified as ‘on track’ if they earn at least five full year course credits, and have received no more than one F per semester. So to be ‘off track’? You do the math.

High schools are working to use this information to keep students in school past the ninth grade. The Everyone Graduates Center at the Johns Hopkins School of Education recommends something called the Freshman Seminar for students in their first year of high school. The program offers learning materials and training specialists to aid students in study and social skills. Some students use it during homeroom or advisory periods, some during special enhancement periods.

“We try to build some relevance into their experience to go along with the regular curriculum,” says Mary Maushard, communications director for the Everyone Graduates Center. “So many of these ninth graders—particularly in high-poverty areas—just don’t see any reason to stay in school.”

There are signs that programs and administrators are getting through to high school freshmen. In Portland, Oregon, Self-Enhancement Inc.–which employs coordinators to oversee 30 high-risk students each, in 12 public schools—takes pride in a 98 percent high-school graduation rate for the students it works with. Goals are set for every student, and the aides are available 24/7 and serve as links between child and school, parent and school, and child and parent.