Nontraditional Families and Childhood Grade Retention

Michael J. Rosenfeld, Stanford University

This paper uses the massive sample size of the U.S. census to compare outcomes for children of different family types, specifically children of same-sex cohabiting couples with children of various types of families headed by heterosexual parents. This paper represents the first (as far as the author knows) large sample nationally representative study of the children of same-sex couples. The results show that heterosexual married couples are the family type whose children have the lowest rates of grade retention, but that the advantage of heterosexual married couples is mostly due to their higher SES. Children of same-sex couples have grade retention rates that are indistinguishable from the children of heterosexual cohabiting couples. In general, differences in grade retention rates between family types are modest. Children of all family types (including children of same-sex couples) have far lower grade retention rates than children living in group quarters. Some implications are discussed.