Dropouts

The History and Predictors of Dropping Out

A student dropping out of high school has long been seen as an issue across K–12 schooling. Students who drop out not only fail to receive instruction and curriculum that the taxpayer has paid for, but students without a high school diploma face tough challenges in the marketplace and in finding high-paying and long-lasting careers. In the early 20th century, the majority of students dropped out of secondary school, or never attended, as only about 20% of all students in the United States graduated with a high school diploma in the early 1920s. During the remainder of that century and into the 21st century, great strides have been made in improving graduation rates, with dropout rates now nationally less than 10% on average. However, there are disparities in dropout rates across the United States, as the national dropout rate hides localized issues of high dropout rates in many urban communities as well as historically underserved communities, such as Hispanic and African American students, as well as students living in urban or rural poverty.

Predictors of which students are most likely to drop out, known as at-risk predictors, have traditionally focused on two main areas: demographics and student performance. For demographics, beyond student context factors—such as ethnicity and poverty—research has focused on student family history, showing that children of parents who did not complete high school or who have siblings who also dropped out are more likely to drop out themselves. However, in searching for a means to help students persist in schools, student context factors are mostly beyond the influence of schools. Thus, [Page 550]much of the at-risk prediction literature has focused on student performance in the schooling system to attempt to identify factors that are associated early with student likelihood of dropping out at a later date. These performance factors include low or failing grades in middle school or ninth grade, high absences, and multiple discipline reports, suspensions, or expulsions. Additionally, the practice of retaining students after course failure in grade for a second year is well-known to predict student dropout, as the majority of students retained in high school do not earn their high school diploma.

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