Robert E. Slavin
Nancy L. Karweit
Barbara A. Wasik
Center for Research on Effective
Schooling for Disadvantaged Students
The Johns Hopkins University
February, 1992
This paper was written
under a grant from the Office of Educational Research and Improvement,
U. S. Department of Education (No. OERI-R-117-R90002). However, any
opinions expressed are our own, and do not necessarily represent OERI
positions or policies.
Once upon a time there was a town that was having
a serious health problem. Approximately 30% of the children in the
town were coming down with typhoid and other diseases because of contaminated
drinking water. The town council allocated millions to medical care
for the typhoid victims, yet some of them died or were permanently
disabled. One day, an engineer proposed to the town council that they
install a water treatment plant, which would prevent virtually all
cases of the disease. "Ridiculous!" fumed the mayor. "We
can't afford it!" The engineer pointed out that they were already
paying millions for treatment of a preventable disease. "But
if we bought a water treatment plant," the mayor responded, "how
could we afford to treat the children who already have the disease?"
"Besides," added a councilman, "most of our children
don't get the disease. The money we spend now is targeted to exactly
the children who need it!" After a brief debate, the town council
rejected the engineer's suggestion.*
The town council's decision in this parable
is, of course, a foolish one. From a purely economic point of view,
the costs of providing medical services to large numbers of children
over a long time were greater than the cost of the water treatment
plant. What is more important, children were being permanently damaged
by a preventable disease.
In education, we have policies that are all
too much like those of the foolish town council. A substantial number
of children fail to learn to read adequately in the early grades.
Many are retained, assigned to special education, or maintained for
many years in remedial programs. The financial costs of providing
long-term remedial services after a student has already failed are
staggering, but even more tragic are the consequences for individual
children who discover so early that they are failing.
Despite some improvements and a growing acceptance
of the idea that prevention and early intervention are preferable
to remediation, the overwhelming emphasis of programs (and funding)
for at-risk students remains on remediation. The unspoken assumption
behind policies favoring remediation and retention over prevention
and early intervention is that there are substantial numbers of students
who, due to low IQ's, impoverished family backgrounds, or other factors,
are unlikely to be able to keep up with their classmates and will
therefore need long-term supportive services to keep them from falling
further behind. Perhaps if early school failure were in fact unavoidable
for the many students who now fail, we might have a rationale for
continuing with the policies we have now.
However, there is a growing body of evidence
that refutes the proposition that school failure is inevitable for
any but the most retarded children. Further, the programs and practices
which, either alone or in combination, have the strongest evidence
of effectiveness for preventing school failure for virtually all students
are currently available and replicable. None of them are exotic or
radical.
This article summarizes the conclusions of a
major, federally funded review of the effects of programs intended
to prevent early school failure by Slavin, Karweit, & Wasik (in
press). Our review focused on a variety of indicators of success and
failure. Most early intervention programs involving students from
birth to age four have used IQ, language proficiency, and other measures
which predict school success and their outcomes. We report these outcomes,
but place greater emphasis on measures of actual school success or
failure: reading performance, retention, and placement in special
education. Whenever possible we emphasize long-term effects of early
interventions.
We review several types of early schooling programs.
One important feature in common to these programs is that all are
expensive, and most are of similar orders of magnitude of cost. For
example, reducing class size by half (e.g., from 30 to 15) involves
hiring an additional certified teacher for each class. This same teacher
could teach a preschool class, could be added to the kindergarten
staff to enable a school to have full-day kindergarten, or could tutor
about fifteen low-achieving first graders twenty minutes per day.
Retention or provision of extra-year programs for kindergartners or
first graders adds one year's per-pupil cost per child -- about $4,000
in round numbers. The costs of Writing to Read and other integrated
CAI programs require at least one additional aide per school plus
initial and continuing costs roughly comparable to the cost of additional
certified teachers. The popularity of all these programs indicates
that we are willing to spend money to prevent early school failure,
but which of these investments pays off?
The Reading Link
The consequences of failing to learn to read
in the early grades are severe. Longitudinal studies find that disadvantaged
third graders who have failed one or more grades and are reading below
grade level are extremely unlikely to complete high school (Lloyd, 1978;
Kelly, Veldman, & McGuire, 1964). Remedial programs, such as Chapter
1, have few if any effects on students above the third grade level (see
Kennedy, Birman, & Demaline, 1986). Many children are referred to
special education programs largely on the basis of reading failure,
and then remain in special education for many years, often for their
entire school careers. Almost all children,
regardless of social class or other factors, enter first grade full
of enthusiasm, motivation, and self-confidence, fully expecting to
succeed in school. By the end of first grade, many of these students
have already discovered that their initial high expectations are not
coming true, and have begun to see school as punishing and demeaning.
Trying to remediate reading failure later on is very difficult, because
by then students who have failed are likely to be unmotivated, to
have poor self-concepts as learners, to be anxious about reading,
and to hate it. Reform is needed at all levels of education, but no
goal of reform is as important as seeing that all children start off
their school careers with success, confidence, and a firm foundation
in reading. Success in the early grades does not guarantee success
throughout the school years and beyond, but failure in the early grades
does virtually guarantee failure in later schooling. This is one problem
that must be solved.
If there is a chance to prevent the negative
spiral that begins with early reading failure from starting, then
it seems necessary to do so. Even very expensive early interventions
can be justified on cost-effectiveness grounds alone if they reduce
the need for later and continuing remedial and special education services,
retentions, and other costs (Barnett & Escobar, 1987). While the
cost-effectiveness estimates associated with the Perry Preschool Model
(Berrueta-Clement et al., 1984) have been criticized as unrealistic
by many researchers (see Holden, 1990), they have contributed to a
widespread acceptance of the idea that early intervention, even if
expensive, ultimately pays back its costs.
Given, then, that there is growing agreement on the proposition that
investments in early intervention are worthwhile, the next question
should be which forms of early intervention are likely to have the
greatest impact?
Birth to Three Interventions
Both child-centered and family-centered interventions
with at-risk children can make a substantial and, in many cases, lasting
difference in their IQ scores (Wasik & Karweit, in press). The child-based
interventions are ones in which infants and toddlers are placed in stimulating,
developmentally appropriate settings for some portion of the day, while
family-centered interventions provide parents with training and materials
to help them stimulate their children's cognitive development, to help
them with discipline and health problems, and to help them with their
own vocational and home management skills.
The IQ effects of the birth-to-three programs were mostly seen immediately
after the interventions were implemented, but in a few cases longer-lasting
effects were found. The extremely intensive Milwaukee Project (Graber,
1988), which provided 35 hours per week of infant stimulation, including
one-on-one interaction with trained caregivers followed by high-quality
preschool, parent training, and vocational skills training, found
the largest long-lasting effects. At age ten, the children (of mildly
retarded mothers) had IQ's like those of low-risk children and substantially
higher than those of a randomly selected control group of at-risk
children. As the project children reached the fourth grade, they were
reading a half year ahead of the control group. Special education
referrals were also reduced. A study of the Gordon Parent Education
Program (Jester & Guinagh, 1983), which provided impoverished
parents with intensive training in child stimulation, found that at
age 10, children who had been in the program at least two years still
had higher IQ's than did a randomly selected control group, and there
were less than half as many special education placements (23% vs.
53%). The Carolina Abecedarian Project provided at-risk children with
intensive infant stimulation and preschool programs seven hours a
day for at least five years, along with services to families. A longitudinal
study (Ramey & Campbell, 1984) found that in kindergarten, first,
and second grades children in the program had higher IQ's and fewer
retentions than similar control students.
The studies of birth-to-three interventions
have demonstrated that IQ is not a fixed attribute of children but
can be modified by changing the child's environment at home and/or
in special center-based programs, and that special education referrals
and retention can be effected. It apparently takes intensive intervention
over a period of several years to produce lasting effects on measures
of cognitive functioning, but even the least intensive models, which
often produced strong immediate effects, may be valuable starting
points for an integrated combination of age-appropriate preventative
approaches over the child's early years.
Impact of Preschool
In comparison to similar children who do not
attend preschool, those who do have been found to be higher in IQ
and language proficiency scores immediately following the preschool
experience, although followup assessments typically find that these
gains do not last beyond the early elementary years at most (see Karweit,
in press a; McKey et al., 1985). In addition, there is little evidence
to indicate that preschool experience has any effect on elementary
reading performance. The most important lasting benefits of preschool
are on other outcomes. Several studies have found lasting effects
of preschool experience on retentions and placements in special education.
Very long-term impacts of preschool on dropouts, delinquency, and
other behaviors have also been found (Berrueta-Clement et al., 1984).
It may be that the effects of preschool on outcomes for teenagers
are due to the shorter-term effects on retentions and special education
placements in the elementary grades. Retentions and special education
placements in elementary school have been found to be strongly related
to high school dropout (Lloyd, 1978).
It is clear that attendance at a high-quality
preschool program has long-term benefits for children, but it is equally
clear that in itself preschool experience is not enough to prevent
early school failure, particularly because preschool effects have
not been seen on student reading performance. Preschool experiences
for four-year-olds should be part of a comprehensive approach to prevention
and early intervention, but a one-year program, whatever its quality,
cannot be expected to solve all the problems of at-risk children.
Kindergarten
Since the great majority of children now attend
kindergarten or other structured programs for five-year-olds, the
main questions about kindergarten in recent years have focused on
full day vs. half-day programs and on effects of particular instructional
models for kindergarten. Research comparing full- and half-day programs
generally finds positive effects of full-day programs on end-of-year
measures of reading readiness, language, and other objectives. However,
the few studies which have examined maintenance of full-day kindergarten
effects have failed to find evidence of maintenance even at the end
of first grade (see Karweit, in press b).
Several specific kindergarten models were found
to be effective on end-of-kindergarten assessments. Among these were
Alphaphonics, Early Prevention of School Failure, and TALK. These
are all structured, sequenced approaches to building pre-reading and
language skills felt to be important predictors of success in first
grade. However, of these only Alphaphonics presented evidence of long-term
effects on student reading performance (Karweit, in press b). IBM's
Writing to Read computer program has had small positive effects on
end-of-kindergarten measures, but longitudinal studies have failed
to show any carryover to first or second grade reading (Freyd &
Lytle, 1990; Slavin, 1991).
Retention, Developmental Kindergarten, and
Transitional First Grades
Many schools attempt in one form or another
to identify young children who are at risk for school failure and
give them an additional year before second grade to catch up with
grade-level expectations. Students who perform poorly in kindergarten
or first grade may simply be retained and recycled through the same
grade. Alternatively, students who appear to be developmentally immature
may be assigned to a two-year "developmental kindergarten"
or "junior kindergarten" sequence before entering first
grade. Many schools have a "transitional first grade" or
"pre-first" program designed to provide a year between kindergarten
and first grade for children who appear to be at risk.
Interpreting studies of retention and early
extra-year programs is difficult. Among other problems, it is unclear
whether the appropriate comparison group should be similar children
of the same age who were promoted or similar children in the same
grade as the one in which students were retained. That is, should
a student who attended first grade twice be compared to second graders
(his original classmates) or first graders (his new classmates)?
Studies which have compared students who experienced
an extra year before second grade have generally found that these
students appear to gain on achievement tests in comparison to their
same-grade classmates, but not in comparison to their agemates. Further,
any positive effects of extra-year programs seen in the year following
the retention or program participation consistently wash out in later
years (Karweit & Wasik, in press; Shepard & Smith, 1989).
Clearly, the experience of spending another year in school before
second grade has no long-term benefits. In contrast, studies of students
who have been retained before third grade find that controlling for
their achievement, such students are far more likely than similar
nonretained students to drop out of school (Lloyd, 1978).
Class Size and Instructional Aides
A popular policy in recent years has been to
markedly reduce class size in the early elementary grades. Because
it is so politically popular and straightforward (albeit expensive)
to implement, class size reduction should in a sense be the standard
against which all similarly expensive innovations should be judged.
Decades of research on class size have established
that small reductions in class size (e.g., from 25 to 20) have few
if any effects on student achievement. However, research has held
out the possibility that larger reductions (e.g., from 25 to 15) may
have educationally meaningful impacts (see Slavin, in press).
The largest and best-controlled study ever done
on this question was a recent statewide evaluation in Tennessee (Word
et al., 1990) in which students were randomly assigned to classes
of 15, 25 with an aide, or 25 with no aide in kindergarten and then
maintained in the same configurations through the third grade. This
study found moderate effects in favor of the small classes as of the
third grade. A year after the study, this difference was still positive
but very small (Nye et al., 1991). Other statewide studies of class
size reduction in the first grade in South Carolina (Johnson &
Roan-Quintana, 1978) and Indiana (Farr, Quilling, Bessel, & Johnson,
1987) found even smaller effects of substantial reductions in class
size.
The Tennessee class size study also evaluated
the effects of providing instructional aides to classes of 25 in grades
K-3. The effects of the aides were near zero in all years (Folger
& Breda, 1990). This is consistent with the conclusions of an
earlier review by Schuetz (1980). However, there is evidence, cited
below, to the effect that aides can be effective in providing one-to-one
tutoring to at-risk first graders.
Reducing class size may be a part of an overall
strategy for getting students off to a good start in school but it
is clearly not an adequate intervention in itself.
Nongraded Primary Programs
The nongraded primary is a form of school organization
in which students are flexibly regrouped according to skill levels
across grade lines and proceed through a hierarchy of skills at their
own paces (Goodlad & Anderson, 1963). This was an innovation of
the 1950's and '60's which is currently making a comeback in the 1990's.
Research from the first wave of implementation
of the nongraded primary support the use of simple forms of this strategy
but not complex ones. Simple forms are ones in which students are
regrouped across grade lines for instruction (especially in reading
and mathematics) and are taught in groups. These simple nongraded
programs primarily have the effect of allowing teachers to accommodate
instruction to individual needs without requiring students to do a
great deal of seatwork (as is necessary in traditional reading groups,
for example). In contrast, complex forms of the nongraded primary
which made extensive use of individualized instruction, learning stations,
and open space, were not generally effective in increasing student
achievement (Gutiérrez & Slavin, 1992).
One-to-One Tutoring
Of all the strategies reviewed in this article,
the most effective by far for preventing early reading failure are
approaches incorporating one-to-one tutoring of at-risk first graders.
Wasik & Slavin (1990) reviewed research on five specific tutoring
models. One of these, the tutoring model used in Success for All,
is discussed below. In addition to Success for All, Reading Recovery
(Pinnell et al., 1988), and Prevention of Learning Disabilities (Silver
& Hagin, 1990) are programs which use certified teachers as tutors;
the Wallach tutoring program (Wallach & Wallach, 1976) and Programmed
Tutorial Reading (Ellison et al., 1968) use paraprofessionals, and
are correspondingly much more prescribed and scripted. The immediate
reading outcomes for all forms of tutoring are very positive, but
the largest and longest-lasting effects have been found for the three
programs which use teachers rather than aides as tutors. Reading Recovery
is a highly structured model requiring a year of training and feedback.
It emphasizes direct teaching of metacognitive strategies, "learning
to read by reading," teaching of phonics in the context of students'
reading, and integration of reading and writing. Two followup studies
of this program have found that strong positive effects seen at the
end of first grade do maintain into second and third grade, but due
to increasing standard deviations in each successive grade effect
sizes diminish. Effects on reducing retentions were found in second
grade in one study, but these effects had mostly washed out by third
grade. Prevention of Learning Disabilities focuses on remediating
specific perceptual deficits as well as improving reading skill, and
usually operates for two school years (Reading Recovery rarely goes
beyond first grade). Reading effects of this program were substantial
in two of three studies at the end of the program, and in one followup
study remained very large as of the end of third grade.
Improving Curriculum and Instruction
One strategy for enhancing early reading performance
is, of course, improving curriculum and instruction in the early grades.
All of the tutoring programs cited above used a particular curriculum
and set of instructional methods, and it is therefore impossible to
separate the unique effects of tutoring from those of the materials
and procedures used. Further, any comprehensive approach to prevention
and early intervention must include an effective approach to curriculum
and instruction in beginning reading.
We do not intend in this article to take on
the current controversy about appropriate instruction in beginning
reading. We generally agree with the conclusions reached by Adams
(1990, p. 416) in a comprehensive, federally mandated review on the
topic:
In summary, deep and thorough knowledge
of letters, spelling patterns, and words, and of the phonological
translations of all three, are of inescapable importance to both skillful
reading and its acquisition. By extension, instruction designed to
develop children's sensitivity to spellings and their relations to
pronunciations should be of paramount importance in the development
of reading skills. This is, of course, precisely what is intended
of good phonic instruction.
Adams goes on to define "good phonic
instruction" as instruction which teaches word attack skills
in the context of meaning, not teaching these skills in isolation
from real reading.
The practice and theory of beginning reading
are changing so rapidly at present that this is a poor time to be
making recommendations about appropriate practice in this area. At
the moment, there is very little evidence to support any of the new
"whole language" approaches in first grade beginning reading
(see, for example, Stahl & Miller, 1989), but such evidence may
develop as these programs gain in sophistication and use.
Combining Multiple Strategies/Success for
All
Each of the strategies presented above has focused
on one slice of the at-risk child's life: ages birth to three, four
(preschool), five (kindergarten), and six to seven (first and second
grades). While the birth to three and preschool programs have often
integrated services to children with services to parents, the programs
for older youngsters have tended to focus only on academics and, in
most cases, only one aspect of the academic program such as class
size, length of day, grouping, or tutoring in reading.
How much could school failure be prevented if
at-risk children were provided with a coordinated set of interventions
over the years designed to prevent learning problems from developing
in the first place and intervening intensively and effectively when
they do occur? This is the question posed in research on Success for
All, summarized below.
Success for All
The idea behind Success for All (Madden et al.,
1991) is to provide children with whatever programs and resources
they need to succeed throughout their elementary years. The emphasis
is on prevention and early intervention. Prevention includes the provision
of high-quality preschool and/or full-day kindergarten programs; research-based
curriculum and instructional methods in all grades, preschool to five;
reduced class size and nongraded organization in reading; building
positive relationships and involvement with parents; and other elements.
Early intervention includes one-to-one tutoring in reading from certified
teachers for students who are beginning to fall behind in first grade,
family support programs to solve any problems of truancy, behavior,
or emotional difficulties, and health or social service problems.
In essence, Success for All combines the most effective interventions
identified in this article and adds to them extensive staff development
in curriculum and instruction and a school organizational plan flexibly
using resources to provide whatever it takes to see that students
read, stay out of special education, and are promoted each year.
Research on Success for All has found substantial
positive effects on the reading performance of all students in grades
1-3, and on reductions in retentions and special education placements
(Slavin et al., 1992). The lasting effects of Success for All into
third grade are the largest of any of the strategies reviewed in this
article, but they cannot be interpreted as maintenance assessments,
as the program continues through the elementary grades. However, with
few exceptions, the program beyond the first grade consists of improved
curriculum, instruction, and family support services, not continued
tutoring.
Consistent Patterns
There is a consistent pattern seen across most
of the programs and practices reviewed in this article. Whatever their
nature, preventative programs tend to have their greatest impacts
on outcomes closely aligned with the intervention and in the years
immediately following the intervention period. The long-term research
on effects of preschool on dropout and related variables is one exception
to this, but on measures of IQ, reading, special education placements,
and retention, preschool effects were like those of other time-limited
interventions. The positive effects seen on these variables were strongest
immediately after the program and then faded over time.
Some might take the observation that effects
of early interventions often fade in later years as an indication
that early intervention is ultimately futile. Yet such a conclusion
would be too broad. What research on early intervention suggests is
that there is no "magic bullet," no program that, administered
for one or two years, will ensure the success of at-risk children
throughout their school careers and beyond. However, it is equally
clear that there are key developmental hurdles that children must
successfully negotiate in their first decade of life, and that we
know how to ensure that virtually all of them do so.
The first hurdle, for children from birth to
five, is development of the cognitive, linguistic, social, and psychological
basis on which later success depends. Second, by the end of first
grade, students should be well on the way to reading. Each year afterward
students need to make adequate progress in basic and advanced skills,
at least enough to avoid any need for remedial or special education
and to be promoted each year.
Research on birth-to-three programs, on preschool,
and on kindergarten shows that we know how to ensure that children
enter first grade with good language skills, cognitive skills, and
self-concepts, no matter what their family backgrounds or personal
characteristics may be. Research on tutoring and on instruction, curriculum,
and organization of early grades education shows that we know how
to ensure that children enter fourth grade reading, regardless of
their family and personal backgrounds. This article focuses on early
interventions, but it is important to note that there are many programs
and practices with strong evidence of effectiveness for at-risk students
throughout the grades (see Slavin, Karweit, & Madden, 1989). Rather
than expecting short-term interventions to have long-term effects,
we need to provide at-risk children with the services they need at
a particular age or developmental stage.
Does this mean that we need to provide intensive
(and therefore expensive) "preventative" services to at-risk
students forever? For a very small proportion of students, a portion
of those now served in special education, perhaps we do. But for the
great majority of students, including nearly all of those currently
served in compensatory education programs and most of those now called
"learning disabled," we believe that intensive intervention
will only be needed for a brief period, primarily one-to-one tutoring
in first grade. After these students are well launched in reading,
they still need high-quality instruction and other services in the
later elementary grades to continue to build on their strong base.
Improving instruction is relatively inexpensive.
If a cook puts a high flame under a stew, brings
it to a boil, and then turns it off, the stew will not cook. If the
cook puts a stew on simmer without first bringing it to a boil, the
stew will not cook. Only by bringing the stew to a boil and then simmering
will the stew cook. By the same token, intensive early intervention
for at-risk children with no followup in improved instruction is unlikely
to produce lasting gains, and mild interventions over extended periods
may also fail to bring low achievers into the educational mainstream.
Yet intensive early intervention followed by long-term (inexpensive)
improvements in instruction and other services can produce substantial
and lasting gains.
The best evidence for this perspective comes
from research on Success for All. This program usually begins with
four-year-olds, giving them high-quality preschool and kindergarten
experiences. These are enough for most children, but for those who
have serious reading problems the program provides one-to-one tutoring,
primarily in first grade. After that, improvements in curriculum and
instruction, plus long-term family support services, are intended
to maintain and build on the substantial gains students make in tutoring.
The program's findings have shown the effectiveness of this approach;
not only do at-risk students perform far better than matched control
students at the end of first grade, but their advantage continues
to grow in second, third, and fourth grades. This is not to say that
the particular elements implemented in Success for All are all optimal
or essential. Other preschool or kindergarten models, reading models,
or tutoring models could be more effective, and outcomes for the most
at-risk children could probably be enhanced by intervening before
age four. What is important here is only one demonstration of the
idea that linking prevention, early intervention, and continuing instructional
improvement can prevent school failure for nearly all students.
How Many Students Can Succeed at What Cost?
What the research summarized in this volume
shows is that virtually every child can succeed in the early grades
in principle. The number who will succeed in fact depends on the resources
we are willing to devote to ensuring success for all and to our willingness
to reconfigure the resources we already devote to remedial and special
education and related services.
We have evidence (particularly from the Success
for All research) to suggest that we can ensure the school success
of the majority of disadvantaged, at-risk students using the local
and Chapter 1 funds already allocated to these schools in different
ways (primarily to improve curriculum, instruction, and classroom
management in the regular classroom). However, to ensure the success
of all at-risk students takes a greater investment. There is a large
category of students who would fail to learn to read without intervention,
but succeed with good preschool and kindergarten experiences, improved
reading curriculum and instruction, and perhaps brief tutoring at
a critical juncture, eyeglasses, family support, or other relatively
inexpensive assistance. A much smaller group of students might require
extended tutoring, more intensive family services, and so on. A smaller
group still would need intensive intervention before preschool as
well as improved early childhood education, tutoring, and other services
to make it in school. One could imagine that any child who is not
seriously retarded could succeed in school if he or she had some combination
of the intensive birth-to-three services used in the Milwaukee project,
the high-quality preschool programs used in the High/Scope model,
the tutoring provided by Reading Recovery or other models, and the
improvements in curriculum, instruction, family support, and other
services (along with tutoring) provided throughout the elementary
grades by Success for All. The cost of ensuring the success of these
extremely at-risk children would, of course, be enormous. Yet a multi-risk
child (such as a child from an impoverished and disorganized home
with low IQ and poor behavior) will, without effective intervention,
cost schools and society an equally enormous amount. Even in the mid-term,
excess costs for special or remedial education over the elementary
years are themselves staggering. This leaves aside the likely long-term
costs of dropout, delinquency, early pregnancy, and so on (see Barnett
& Escobar, 1977). The key issue for at-risk students is not if
additional costs will be necessary, but when they should be provided.
By every standard of evidence, logic, and compassion, dollars used
preventatively make more sense than the same dollars used remedially.
The good news in research on prevention and
early intervention is that early school failure is fundamentally preventable.
The implications of this should be revolutionary. What it means is
that at the policy level, we can choose to eradicate school failure
or we can allow it to continue. What we cannot do is pretend that
we do not have a choice.
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