Focusing on at-risk teens
Report: Boston schools take aim at dropout rate
By Tony Lee
Metro
February 13, 2009
BOSTON - Targeted interventions and the use of data to identify at-risk students have helped several area high schools dramatically reduce dropout rates, according to a report released Thursday.
The Rennie Center for Education Research and Policy observed similar approaches at most of the schools for retaining students.
Eight of the 11 schools used data to identify students who are at risk to drop out, focused on middle school rates of attendance, suspension and academic success. According to Brighton High School’s Headmaster Toby Romer, the data “allowed these students not to be invisible.”
Jill Norton, executive director of the Rennie Center, indicated that most officials said that the primary cause for dropouts are not academic but familial. Many students are needed at home for work or child care.
“One of the principals said their kids are being pressured by their families to drop out,” Norton said. “This current economic environment hasn’t made anything better.”
Support for transition into ninth grade was critical.
“[School officials] see a lot of kids stuck and more prone to drop out because they can’t get past the ninth grade,” Norton said.
Common among the success stories were credit recovery programs and targeted nontraditional methods.