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Dropout Prevention Online


Course Outline


Course Description

The dropout rate for public schools is often used as an indicator of the success or failure of public educators. One circumstance that reinforces this source of criticism is that no indisputable theory or explanation is accessible to understand the problem of school dropouts. For example, few critics are aware the dropout rates quoted differ significantly over time. It is important for teachers and administrators to know how dropout rates are calculated to confront unmerited criticism. Presently there are three types of dropout rates reported:

  • Event dropout rates measure the proportion of students who drop out in a single year without completing high school;Status dropout rates measure the proportion of the population that has not completed high school and is not enrolled at one point in time, regardless of when they dropped out; and
  • Cohort dropout rates measure what happens to a single group (or cohort) of students over a period of time.

Each type results in different dropout statistics. For example:

  • Event Rate grades 10-12 4.4 percentStatus Rate ages 16-24 11.1 percent
  • Cohort Rate grades 8-12 ranges between 6.8 percent grades 8-10 and 9 percent for grades 10 and 12

Though the rates compiled by each type of dropout rate appear low, the actual numbers are substantial. For example, the status dropout rate represents approximately 3.4 million students. In a society embracing technology, rapid change, and increasing complexity, the accumulation of school dropouts is a problem that must be resolved. Although no theory is in place to explain why a student drops out, there is abundant information about who drops out. We know, for example, dropout rates are related to a variety of individual and family demographics and socioeconomic characteristics. We know rates are higher for minority students and for those from disadvantaged backgrounds. Dropout rates are higher for blacks and Hispanics than for whites. Rates for males and females are similar. Dropout rates are higher for students from low socioeconomics backgrounds, single-parent families, and non-English speaking family backgrounds. Students whose parents or siblings were dropouts are themselves more likely to dropout. Students who marry and have children before graduation from high school are at risk for dropping out.

Discrete facts and information are useful, but an explanation that relates what we know into a workable approach to diminish the dropout rates is needed and meeting that need is the purpose of this course. The explanation systematically presented during the ten modules is based on both current research (Preuss, 2003; Clapper, Leha, Thurlow, 2005; Wayman, 2002; Lawrence, Joydeep, 2006; Cassel, 2003; Klein, 2003) and historical research (Cloward, Ohlin, 1978; Elliot, Voss, 1974; Merton, 1938; Rogers, 1961). Participants will develop and apply an explanation of school dropouts to both problems and program construction. Participants will exit this course with a "back home" strategy to implement a dropout prevention approach based on the explanation. Participants will achieve the following objectives:

Objectives

  • Define who is a dropout
  • Identify ways to count dropouts
  • Evaluate statistical information regarding dropouts
  • Formulate an explanation of why a student makes a decision to leave school early
  • Analyze a test to measure attributes associated wit<brh school dropout
  • Create definitions for end behavior, antecedent, ripple effect, attributes, and cause
  • Utilize attributes, antecedents, end behavior, ripple effects, and cause to identify potential dropouts
  • Delineate the influence of the school on students who choose to drop out
  • Assess the impact of interventions with the attributes, antecedents, end behavior, ripple effects, and cause of drop outs
  • Determe methods to use an instructional system to prevent dropout.
  • Appraise the impact of a school's social system on dropout rates
  • Create an intervention strategy to reduce dropout rate
  • Create a strategic intervention outline

Curriculum Design & Time Requirements

The pedagogical emphasis is to translate research on school dropouts to prevention strategies teachers may implement in their classrooms. Most activities are experimental in design. The primary teaching tool is the student manual which contains readings, problems, case studies, glossary, important sources to obtain current information, and samples of the mid-term and final exam. This is a sixty-hour, three credit graduate level course completed over a thirteen-week period.

Hardware & Computer Skills Requirements

Students may use either a Macintosh computer or a PC with Windows 2000 or higher. Students should possess basic word processing skills and have internet access with an active e-mail account. Students also are expected to have a basic knowledge of how to use a Web browser, such as Microsoft Internet Explorer, Safari, Mozilla Firefox etc.

Course Materials

The required text for this course is, Strategies to Help Solve Our School Dropout Problem, by Franklin P. Schargel and Jay Smink. The textbook and course materials will be provided for all students. A variety of readings will be referenced throughout the course. Other supplemental readings will be provided.

Session Outline

Session 1: Identifying and Documenting School Dropouts
Contents:
  1. Introductions
  2. Dropout Overview
  3. Defining who is a dropout
  4. Use three methods for calculating school dropouts
  5. Why dropout is a national problem
  6. Essential terms related to dropout
  7. No theory to explain dropping out as a primary source of criticism
  8. Grading, long-term assignments, and assignments

Session 2: Review of Related Research
Contents:
  1. Review current research on school dropouts
  2. Review historical research on school dropouts
  3. Derived generalizations from current and historical research
  4. String together the generalization
  5. Review the concept of theory
  6. Assignments

Session 3: Initiate an Explanation of School Dropout
Contents:
  1. Define theory
  2. Review what dropouts say about dropping out
  3. Relate and compare student explanation with generalizations
  4. What determines how a student will experience school
  5. The relationship between cause and effect
  6. Expand the Evolving Explanation of School Dropout
  7. Assignments

Session 4: Introduce and Define: End behavior, Antecedent, Ripple Effect, and Cause
Contents:
  1. Relationships among major ideas (Continuation of Session Three Objectives)
  2. Revisit research
  3. Connecting end behaviors and ripple effect
  4. Antecedents to cause
  5. Propensity to experience school
  6. Assignments

Session 5: Identifying the Potential Dropout
Contents:
  1. Dyads sharing
  2. Delineate a dropout profile
  3. Relate the explanation to identification
  4. Use of surveys, questionairs, and interviews based on the explanation
  5. Dialogue
  6. School transition
  7. Testing
  8. Mid-Term
  9. Assignments

Session 6: Examine the Role of the School in Dropouts
Contents:
  1. Identifying school cultures
  2. Indentify a rejection/acceptance continuum
  3. Assimilate peer relations into the explanation
  4. Four reasons for dropping out as related to in the explanation
  5. The means/aspirations connection
  6. Critical point analysis
  7. Grade retention
  8. Assignments

Session 7: Program/Interventions Overview
Contents:
  1. Review dropout prevention programs
  2. Assess dropout prevention programs using the explanation
  3. Attribution and internal/external blame
  4. Self-Esteem issues
  5. Program/Intervention assessment checklist
  6. Inventory of program/interventions by title and area
  7. Assignments

Session 8: Implementation Action Plan
Contents:
  1. Outline a pedagogy to accommodate dropouts
  2. Embedded lessons
  3. Instructional system components
  4. Critical point experience
  5. The social context
  6. Assignments

Session 9: The Explanation
Contents:
  1. Identify the functional relationships of components used in explaining school dropout
  2. Compare the "explanation" to the status of a theory
  3. Use the explanation to construct a dropout prevention strategy
  4. Assignments

Session 10: Model Uses-Implementation
Contents:
  1. Present participant dropout prevention strategies
  2. Review uses of the explanation to explain dropout
  3. Develop a "back home" strategy
  4. Course Evaluation
  5. Final Exam

Grading

  Assignment Points   Grading Scale  
  Forum Participation  20      100 – 93 A
  Reflection Assignments  40       92 – 85 B
  Implemenation Plan  25       84 – 77 C
  Mid-Term   5    
    Final Exam  10            
  Total Points  100    


Student Requirements

1. Actively participate in all forum activities.
2. Reading Assignments: Complete all reading & reflection assignments. 
3. Complete the Implementation Plan
4. Pass a mid-term and final exam.

Student Academic Integrity

Participants guarantee that all academic class work is original. Any academic dishonesty or plagiarism (to take ideas, writings, etc. from another and offer them as one's own), is a violation of student academic behavior standards as outlined by our partnering colleges and universities and is subject to academic disciplinary action.

Register

To register to take TEI's Dropout Prevention Online course, go to the Course Registration page.