Locating and Locating and Preventing the Preventing the Dropout CrisisDropout Crisis

How to Target and TransformHigh Schools Which Produce

The Nation’s Dropouts

Robert Balfanz & Nettie LegtersCenter for Social Organization of Schools

Johns Hopkins UniversityPrepared for the National High School Center Summer Institute

June 11, 2007

Why Transform Low Performing High

Schools?

Dropout CrisisDropout Crisis1.2 million students

drop out of high school each year

7,000/day, 12 million over the next decade

Half of the nation’s dropouts attended a dropout factory

Where Did All TheWhere Did All TheFreshmen Go?Freshmen Go?

484

327

259

19712th Graders

11th Graders

10th Graders

9th Graders

Number of 9th Graders in 1996/97 = 669% Fewer 12th graders in 1999/2000 than 9th graders 1996/97

= 71%

How Many Dropout Factories Are There?

Number of High Schools Nationally by Different Levels of Promoting Power (Class of 2003, 2004 and 2005)

1,827 1,860

2,9553,372

4,629

0

1,000

2,000

3,000

4,000

5,000

0-60% 61-70% 71-80% 81-89% 90% or more

Average Promoting Power

Where Are The Nation’s Dropout

Factories Located?

•About Half are Located in Northern, Midwestern and Western

Cities•The rest are primarily found

throughout the South and Southwest

Counties with 1 or more weak promoting power high schools (gray shading) and counties with 5 or more weak promoting power high schools (black shading), 2003-04

Who Attends Dropout Who Attends Dropout Factories? Factories?

Students who live in Poverty

Minority Students

Dropout Factories and Minority Concentration

Percentage of High Schools by Minority Concentration that are Dropout Factories

2% 5%

39%56%

0%20%40%

60%80%

100%

Less than 10%minority

(n=5,941)

50% or lessminority

(n=11,216)

More than 50%minority

(n=3,097)

More than 90%minority

(n=1,064)

Minority Concentration

Percent of Minority Students Attending Dropout Factories

Percentage of the Nation's Minority Student Populations in Dropout Factories

40%33%

8%

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

African American Latino White

Percentage of Race/Ethnicity Group

Poverty and Dropout Factories

Percentage of Schools that are Dropout Factories by Percentage of Students Eligible for Free or Reduced-Price Lunch

1% 2% 4%8%

15%

24%28%

42%

98%93%

85%77%

71%65%

60%54%

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

0-9%

10-1

9%

20-2

9%

30-3

9%

40-4

9%

50-5

9%

60-6

9%

70%

or m

ore

Percentage of Students Eligible for Free or Reduced-Price Lunch (2004-05)

Percent of Schools that are Dropout Factories Class of 2005 Overall Promoting Power

Consequences of Consequences of Dropping OutDropping Out

A new high school dropout in 2000 had less than a 50% chance of getting a job

That job earned less than ½ of what the same job earned 20 years ago

Lack of education is ever more strongly correlated with welfare dependency and incarceration

Some U.S. jobs cannot be filled by U.S. trained skilled employees

It Doesn’t Have to Be This Way

Is It Possible…

to create systems of high schools that create success and opportunity for all students, regardless of color, creed, or socio-economic status?

to create organizations that are so open, so responsive, so resourced, so skillful, that movement toward that ideal is inevitable?

What Does This System

Look Like?Essential Elements

The Yoga ofHigh School Reform– High standards AND relevance

AND personalization– Organization AND Instruction– Literacy AND Math– New small schools AND Large

School Conversions– Prescription AND Participation– The Tortoise AND The Hare

How Do We Create These Systems?

• Identify Schools and Students

• Implement System of Comprehensive, Targeted, and Intensive Interventions

• Models and Evidence• States as Brokers of

Diversified Portfolio of High Schools

ChallengesChallenges

Transforming low performing high schools and systems is not easy, fast, or cheap

Not EasyNot Easy Need comprehensive and

systemic approach to avoid isolated efforts that exacerbate inequity

Consider multiple approaches as appropriate to context

Develop and scale-up technical and human supports for transformation

Align federal, state, district, and school-based efforts

Not FastNot Fast“The trick is how to sustain interest in a

reform that requires a generation to complete.”

Debbie Meyer

NCLB & States must acknowledge reality and progress using multiple indicators

Not CheapNot Cheap Continue and expand

public and private funding

Institutionalize targeted resources– Title I– Perkins– Dedicated Fund for Low

Performing High Schools

Benefits > CostsBenefits > CostsA recent study finds that

our nation can recoup 45 billion dollars in lost tax revenues, health care expenditures, and social service outlays if we cut the number of high school dropouts in half (Levin et. al, 2007).

Coming Soon…Coming Soon…

Graduation Promise Act (GPA)$2.5 Billion High School

Reform/Dropout Reduction Bill co-sponsored by Senators Bingaman (D-NM) and Burr (R-NC)

What Would You DoWith $40 Million?

If We Act Now…

We Can Transform the Nation’s Dropout Factories and Grad Gap High Schools

In So Doing we canTransform the Nation

The Last Slide

The Center for Social Organization of SchoolsJohns Hopkins University

3003 N. Charles St., Ste. 200Baltimore, MD 21218

410-516-8800www.csos.jhu.edu