Forced to Redshirt: Quasi-Experimental Impacts of Delayed Kindergarten EntryJade M. JenkinsauthorC. Kevin FortnerauthorRedshirtingRelative AgeKindergarten entryachievementEarly childhoodParents and communitiesProgram and policy effects2019Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown UniversityWe provide causal estimates of the effects of delayed kindergarten entry on achievement outcomes by exploiting a policy change in the birthdate enrollment cutoff in North Carolina that forced children born in a six-week window to redshirt. Using multiple peer group comparisons, we identify impacts on achievement and gifted or disability identifications in third through fifth grades. Delayed entry provides small benefits to students’ math and reading achievement, and reduced identification of a disability; these impacts operate through cohort position and age advantages, and not from hold-out year experiences. Redshirting differentially benefitted low-income students, but further disadvantaged non-white students.engtextgrey literatureedworkingpapers.com10.26300/mb5s-p142In Copyright