tonight, special correspondent john tulenko of learning matters television, which produces reports on education for the newshour, returned to ohio to see how that's working. >> reporter: two years ago, the city of cincinnati and others across ohio faced a major problem: on a national reading test, 60% of fourth-graders were failing, a gap that many we spoke with then feared would just grow wider. >> we don't teach reading in fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh grade. so if they haven't learned that, they're not going to learn it. and that's just unacceptable. >> reporter: so two years ago, republican state senator peggy lehner put a wall around fourth grade, passing legislation that promised to hold back any third grader who failed the state's reading test. ohio called it the third grade reading guarantee. >> it's now or never. we're finished with passing kids along that are unable and unprepared to actually reach success at the higher grade levels. >> reporter: at the outset, third-grade teacher linda hissett of carson elementary in cincinnati welcomed the guarantee, and saw it as a soluti