Dropout Reporting and NCLB Compliance in U.S. Schools
This page examines articles and studies that explore the often-murky area of how the states count and report students who drop out of school. Since these statistics can relate to how performance is measured and can have potential impact on school funding, this is a policy area undergoing scrutiny by state and federal education officials alike.
Federal requirements including the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), require
states to report high school rates of "non-completion." Before the Act became law in 2001, schools could count and report students who abandoned traditional classrooms for General Education Development (GED) programs as successfully completing high school.
NCLB links student "non-completion" rates with students who drop out, including those who transfer to a high school equivalency program.
NCLB revises Title I, which seeks to improve academic achievement among disadvantaged students. Under NCLB, the definition of Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) has been revised to specify that in defining graduation
rates, states must avoid counting a dropout as a transfer student. States also are required to provide performance targets for dropout reduction and collect suspension and expulsion data.
Under the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) the states are required to report all local education agency (LEA) data regarding annual school dropout rates disaggregated by race and ethnicity according to procedures established by the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) Common Core of Data.
To be consistent with this requirement, states must adopt the NCES definition of a "dropout." NCES specifies that a dropout is a student in grades nine through 12 who fits any of the following criteria: was enrolled in the district during the previous school year; was not enrolled at the beginning of the succeeding school year; has not graduated or completed a
program of study by the maximum age established by the state; has not transferred to another public school district, to a non-public school or to a state-approved educational program; or a student who has left school for reasons other than death, illness, or school-approved absence.
This change in reporting requirements could negatively impact a school's performance and ultimately, its funding under the Act.
General Information
Harvard Civil Rights Project
Dropouts in America: How severe is the problem? What do we know about intervention and prevention? (Several working papers are offered to answer these questions.)
http://www.civilrightsproject.harvard.edu/research/dropouts/call_dropoutpapers.php
Manhattan Institute (Gates Foundation)
Education Week
Education Week
Is John Doe a dropout?
http://www.edweek.org/ew/ewstory.cfm?slug=21dropout.h20
Education Week
Federal Dropout Reporting Requirements
United States Department of Education (DOE)
State Education Indicators with a Focus on Title I
http://www.ed.gov/offices/OUS/PES/esed/2002_indicators/titlepage.html
DOE
Issues in Texas with Counting Dropouts and Accountability
New York Times
Questions on Data Cloud Luster of Houston Schools
"A recent state audit in Houston, which examined records from 16 middle and high schools, found that more than half of the 5,500 students who left in the 2000-1 school year should have been declared dropouts but were not. That year, Houston schools reported that only 1.5 percent of its students had dropped out. The audit, which recommended lowering the ranking of 14 of the 16 schools from the best to the worst, has been a stunning blow to the Houston school system, the largest and most celebrated district in Texas. Last year, the city won a $1 million prize as best urban district in the country, from the Broad Foundation, which is based in Los Angeles. The city has also been a pillar of the "Texas miracle" in education, whose emphasis on grading school performance became the model for the rest of the country under the federal No Child Left Behind Act. It was largely on the strength of his success here that Rod Paige, Houston's former superintendent, followed George W. Bush east to become secretary of education. Now, some here are questioning whether the miracle may have been smoke and mirrors, at least on the high school level...."
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/11/national/11HOUS.html
Austin American Statesman
Texas Education Agency
TEA: Dropout Audit Update
TEA
Star-Telegraph
Education Policy Analysis Archives
The Myth of the Texas Miracle in Education
Counting Dropouts in Washington
Letter from the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) discussing reporting requirements under RCW 28A.175.010
http://www.k12.wa.us/bulletinsmemos/bulletins2002/b044-02.pdf
OSPI
Seattle Times
Manhattan Institute (Gates Foundation)
Selected State Information on Dropout Reporting Requirements
Illinois State Board of Education
Massachusetts Department of Education
Virginia Department of Education
Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction
http://www.dpi.state.wi.us/dpi/esea/bul_0210.htmlhttp://www.pen.k12.va.us/VDOE/Publications/NCLB/student.htmlhttp://www.doe.mass.edu/ata/NCLBapproval.htmlhttp://www.emsd63.n-cook.k12.il.us/District/SchoolReportCards02/ReportCard02def.pdfStudy on Washington Dropout Rates
http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/cr_27.htmState Dropout Rate at 33 Percent
Article on the Manhattan Institute Study on Washington counting methods. OSPI officials say the counting methods already are changing.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/134523592_dropout28m.htmlGraduation and Dropout Statistics for Washington's Counties, Districts, and Schools Final Report, School Year 2000-01
http://www.k12.wa.us/dataadmin/reports/DG2000-01.pdf"I summarize the recent history of education reform and statewide testing in Texas, which led to introduction of the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) in 1990-91. A variety of evidence in the late 1990s led a number of observers to conclude that the state of Texas had made near miraculous progress in reducing dropouts and increasing achievement...."
http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v8n41/Panel Appointed to Look into Tests Score and Dropout Fraud (1999)
State Comptroller Carole Keeton Rylander appointed a panel yesterday to ferret out instances in which public school administrators falsify standardized test scores and records on dropout rates.
http://www.star-telegram.com/news/doc/1047/1:METRO35/1:METRO35092199.html
Dropout Definition, Data Collection and Methodology (Method formerly used)
http://www.tea.state.tx.us/research/dropout95/definition.html (Audit was slated for completion in 9/02)
Dropout audit guidance is provided in the information accessible through the links provided below. The dropout audit requirements are explained in the draft version of Module 11 of the Financial Accountability System Resource Guide. The final version of the Module is to be published prior to September 2002 after a pilot audit of leaver code data. Module 11 represents the primary training document for independent auditors that will be engaged by school districts (the first agreed-upon procedure reports are due April 2003 for the audit of leaver data reported by districts through PEIMS in October 2002).
http://www.tea.state.tx.us/school.finance/audit/resguide8/dropoutaudit/dropoutauditmodule11.docDropout Study: A Report to the 77th Texas Legislature (Authorized 2001)
This legislatively mandated study of Texas' dropout-reporting methods, is available from the Texas Legislative Budget Board, (http://www.lbb.state.tx.us/) the State Auditor's Office, and the Texas Education Agency (http://www.tea.state.tx.us/). The study was published December 2000. The study: http://www.tea.state.tx.us/research/dropout/rider71study/Tackling Texas' Dropout Problem
"Next year, Texas plans to change how it counts dropouts. The new numbers will push the state's official 1 percent annual dropout rate -- which looks at the number of students who leave school in a year -- to 19 percent by using what's known as a completion rate. That rate looks at the number of students who fail to finish high school in four years with their classmates. And that means a whole lot more students counted as dropouts."
http://www.austin360.com/statesman/editions/monday/news_2.htmlFederal Education Funding Opportunities and Requirements
http://www.ed.gov/offices/OESE/SASA/handouts/sns.htmlCommon Methods of Counting School Dropouts
In a recent study prepared for Texas legislators, the state's Legislative Budget Board examined the advantages and disadvantages of various methods of calculating the number of students who quit school without a diploma. Using figures provided by the Texas Education Agency, the study found that the methods yielded dramatically different pictures of the severity of the state's dropout problem.
http://www.edweek.org/ew/vol-20/21dropout-t1.h20The Dropout Dilemma
Imagine this scenario: John Doe, a 17-year-old student at Big City High School, informs administrators there that he is quitting school to enroll in an adult education program across town. He plans to earn a high-school-equivalency diploma. Who Counts as a Dropout?
"High school completion rates vary depending on how the term is defined. The blue line below includes 18- to 24-year-olds with high school diplomas as well as alternatives such as the GED certificate. The yellow line counts only those with diplomas."
http://www.edweek.org/ew/ewstory.cfm?slug=21dropoutbox1.h20High School Graduation Rates in the U.S.
"The lack of candor about the rate at which public school students graduate high school is a fundamental problem in education. The rates at which students graduate high school provide us with information about the effectiveness of those schools. Unless we have reliable information about graduation rates we cannot begin to consider the severity of problems or make comparisons about the effectiveness of schools in different areas or for different groups of students."
http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/cr_baeo.htm |