SURVEY

Canada: Dropouts have their reasons

Most Canadian youth who drop out of high school cite school-related reasons as the cause, a new Statistics Canada survey has found. Struggles with school work or teachers, missing credits and getting kicked out for bad behaviour were the reasons most frequently given by both sexes for leaving school without a diploma. On average, these dropouts had lower scores in reading literacy and lower marks — one in three had an overall average of less than 59 per cent, compared with one in 10 with that average among their graduating counterparts.

These students were less socially and academically engaged in school and more likely to feel that discipline was unevenly handled, that students were not respected and that their school was a hostile environment.

The study suggests that social and economic forces play a role in shaping such perceptions, attitudes and scholastic performance among dropouts.

A higher proportion of dropouts compared with graduating students in the survey lived in households with lower average incomes. Their parents were less likely to have completed post-secondary education and less likely to have high expectations that their children would complete it. Dropouts were also more likely to have peers that got into trouble before leaving school.

The findings are based on data from the Youth in Transition Survey, in which Canadians aged 15 and 18-20 were interviewed in 2000 and interviewed again in 2002.

By the second cycle, more than 45,000 youth aged 17 and 20 to 22 in 10 provinces had been interviewed.

About 3 per cent of 17-year-olds, who were 15 during the first round of interviews, left high school without a diploma. There was little difference in the dropout rate along gender lines.

In the first round of surveying, by contrast, 11 per cent of people aged 18 to 20 had dropped out of high school, with a significantly higher dropout rate for men than women — 15 per cent versus 10 per cent.

Of these dropouts, 8 per cent had returned to high school two years later and earned their diplomas, and another 6 per cent were currently attending classes.

Young dropouts who were working part time were nearly twice as likely to go back to school as those working full time, suggesting that the labour market played a role in their decision.

By Luma Muhtadie
14 April 2004

http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040405.wteen0405/BNStory/National/

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