Fewer repeaters in classrooms: progress against school failure or statistics?

"With a class of 25 or 30 students, you do what you can."

• Aragón is looking for 605 Primary and 462 Secondary teachers to start the course

• EFE

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UPDATED 8/29/2025 AT 07:52

Back to school: start of the school year at the Ensanche de Teruel school Antonio García / Bykofoto

The school repetition rate has decreased year by year until reaching a historic low of 1.1% in primary school and 7.0% in Compulsory Secondary Education (ESO), although individualized plans and a reduction in the number of students per classroom are needed for this data to be a true advance in the fight against school failure and not just a statistic.

This is explained by several professionals and specialists consulted by EFE, based on the data from the latest statistics from the Ministry of Education, corresponding to the 2022-23 academic year, which reflect that the decline of recent years continues, since in the 2021-22 academic year, the repetition rate stood at 2.1% in primary school and 7.6% in ESO.

The latest educational law was approved in 2020. It is the Organic Law of Modification of the Organic Law of Education (Lomloe), which establishes that repetition must be an exceptional measure: in primary school it is only allowed to repeat once, and always at the end of the cycle (2nd, 4th or 6th year), while in ESO students will not be able to repeat more than two times throughout the compulsory stage.

"It is not enough to lower repetition if at the same time there are no support programs for students and their families to prevent, help and ensure that they learn enough to complete the educational stages successfully," defends the former Secretary of State for Education and professor of Evolutionary Psychology at the Complutense University of Madrid, Álvaro Marchesi.

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The professor is in favor of Lomloe, but insists that specific programs are needed that focus on centers with students from disadvantaged social backgrounds or those with higher school dropouts, which, according to him, would imply "a clear reduction of students per classroom, more counselors, reinforcement teachers and resources."

Furthermore, Marchesi considers it necessary to "incentivize teachers, regulate their professional development and implement voluntary supervised self-evaluation programs" that involve financial incentives, especially in centers with students with greater difficulties.

"With a class of 25 or 30 students, you do what you can"

"The resources are minimal and with a class of 25 or 30 students, you do what you can. In practice it is difficult to manage this individualized monitoring the following year (...). First, second and third, removing exceptional cases, you pass more or less of the year, and in the fourth year of ESO there is more filtering with students who go to PFI (training and insertion programs)," explains David Fernández, a secondary school teacher in Barcelona with experience in the concerted, and currently in the public.

Fernández points out that although we try to vary activities to adapt them to all students, it is very difficult for a single teacher to serve those who have more difficulties or those who could advance faster because time and resources are limited.

"Last year I taught 18 hours of class and had the support of a classmate for one hour a week because a student had special educational needs and could help me with others, but in the case of repeaters there is nothing similar ," says the secondary school teacher, who believes that as long as the same ratio of students continues it will be difficult to keep an eye on each case.

"If you give him more time, but do not change how it is taught, he will continue not learning"

The professor of Evolutionary Psychology at the Autonomous University of Madrid (UAM) and collaborator in educational laws such as the Logse or LOE, Elena Martín, defends that when a student has not learned, it is not only his fault, but also that of an educational system that has not managed to adjust.

"Reinforcing in an individualized way does not mean that there are no inequalities, because there will always be them, but it is a certain compensation that makes schools a more inclusive social function mechanism ," Martín assured in statements to EFE.

The professor defends that it not be repeated because it allows the student to continue in their group and have higher expectations.