The High-School Graduate and Dropout

Abstract

The purpose of the research is to make a comparative study of graduate and non graduates (or dropouts) of high schools in the Metropolitan Area of New York City in terms of the educational and vocational ad justments which had been made during or subsequent to their school experience. It includes a study of the trends which were evident in the adjustments of youth. The research is limited to students of schools offering the commercial or academic courses. It is limited to the period from June, 1934, to February, 1936. It is limited also to a study of those factors which are associated chiefly with educational and voca tional adjustments. The problem draws its chief importance from the need to evaluate the results of sec ondary school achievement, specifically focussed in this case upon the existing dif ferences in adjustments between graduates and dropouts. The problem of evaluation becomes particularly important since the secondary-school is now in the process of absorbing into its student body a section of youth who have been forced into the school through lack of employment opportunities and a steadily rising compulsory school age. The fact that for the last few years the number of dropouts from this type of school has conservatively averaged 40,000 per year on the secondary-school level alone in the New York City school system, points to the reality of the problem.