WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT DROPPING OUT OF HIGH SCHOOL?

The article discusses the increasing dropout rate of students from high schools in the United States. Nearly one-third of ninth graders do not graduate from high school. However, this overall rate masks substantial local variations. For example, Minnesota has the lowest rate (9.4 percent) and Louisiana has the highest (45.3 percent). Also, most major cities have dropout rates approaching 50 percent or higher. In short, most school districts suffer at least a moderate dropout rate; over half of the administrators in districts with at least 25000 students report this problem. In 1900, 90 percent of those attending high school failed to finish. By 1920 that figure had declined to 80 percent, and in the 1950s it sank below 50 percent. The rate has hovered around 25 to 30 percent since the late 1960s. The negative status of being a dropout is not expected or planned by most students. Becoming a dropout is apparently more a largely unintended social transition produced by a complex interaction of personal, social, and structural factors than a deliberate individual choice made after careful consideration of all the options.