Dropout Prevention

Ask the Expert.

The high school dropout problem is a severe epidemic for the United States, as nationwide, it is reported that only 71 percent of students graduate from high school. Understanding the magnitude of the problem and the forces that impact dropout rates is critically important to developing effective strategies. High school students are dropping out at alarming rates every day across the country. There is urgency for obtaining more accurate, consistent, and timely data to analyze who is dropping out and the reasons contributing to these life-altering decisions.

To curb the alarming dropout rate, school systems should focus prevention efforts in the beginning of the middle grades if not earlier. The key indicators that researchers have identified as indicative of who is most likely to drop out are: poor grades in core subjects, low attendance, failure to be promoted to the next grade, and disengagement in the classroom, including behavioral problems.

These key indicators can assist decision makers in targeting prevention resources to the students most at risk of imminently leaving school. Some very useful prevention strategies include: small learning communities and school within a school for greater personalization, partnerships between high schools and feeder middle schools, ninth grade transition programs, support for students with disabilities outside of school.

I wonder if improving reading scores beginning in the very early grades would have a positive effect. Also see Bill Milliken's The Last Dropout.

Comments

[James Marcus Bach]

Speaking proudly as a high school dropout, it seems to me the dropout rate is not a problem, but the beginning of a solution to the problem of the insufferable arrogance and increasing irrelevance of public education.

The colonial/imperial mentality of bringing "civilization to savages" is alive and well in our public schools, and many private ones.

I don't think it can be reformed. The institutions are not listening. So I encourage every student who feels poorly served by the system to leave it. There are some kids who like being led around by the nose. Let them go to school.

(I feel bad for the minority of dedicated and caring teachers who risk their careers to create oases of freedom within the system. And I also feel bad for the dedicated and caring teachers who can't bring themselves to trust and work with the natural rhythms of learning that operate in all of us.)