Our personal and professional lives intersect: the story of how one young man dropped out of a doctoral program in physics to figure out what to do about the continuing problem of dropout in higher education.

The numbers of disconnected youths (adolescents and young adults aged 16 to 21 who have dropped out of school and who don't have jobs) in adult education programs continue to grow at the Turning Point Educational Center in Brooklyn, New York. These youths can be particularly challenging to teach. They often have negative attitudes toward what they…

The author argues that exercise may be a unique health behavior, leaving researchers with problems in understanding exercise compliance. New definitions, new methods, and broader perspectives are needed. Four theories of compliance are described, and problems of research methodology are discussed. (Author/MT)

Examines dropouts from U.S. high schools, with particular attention to gender, social class, and race/ethnicity. Considers dropping out as a critique of education and labor market conditions and looks at the portrayal of dropouts in the popular, social science, and teacher preparation literature. Examines a group of dropouts in New York City.(CMG)

The school-leaving pattern of students aged 14 in 1978 was recorded by the Austin (Texas) Independent School District from 1978 to 1983, providing data on the socioeconomic, academic, and behavioral characteristics of dropouts and their reasons for dropping out. Several preventative measures are suggested. (PGD)

A study of over 100 dropouts from schools in the western suburbs of Chicago (Illinois) permitted researchers to develop this descriptive overview of the school experiences and family situations typical among dropouts and to offer suggestions for helping potential dropouts stay in school and adjust successfully. (PGD)

Inflation affects students, school employees, and educational budgets. Need for higher income encourages students and teachers to leave school systems for temporary higher paying alternatives. This transfer out of the school hampers the potential quality of the educational foundation, making inflation a detrimental factor to the quality of future…

This presentation describes dropout facts and prevention methods based on nationwide interviews with dropout runaways. Potential dropout runaways might be labeled the "distracted ones." They have trouble concentrating in a typical classroom situation as they are distracted by events that happened at home or that might happen after school. Such…

Thirteen teenage editors of "Children's Express" investigated the dropout crisis by talking with teenagers who had quit school, with those who had returned to give it a second chance (back-to-schoolers), and with others who were fighting at all odds to hang in there (hangers-in). Hundreds of youth from five American cities--Newark, Boston, Kansas…

Graduates and nongraduates of higher educational institutions have long been a focus of widespread research over the last two decades. Research findings reveal that graduating from a school of higher education is a bridge to better personal status, institutional progress, and national well being. (SSH)

Emphasis on basis skills, standardized testing and curriculum standardization in alternative education programs creates the same conditions that originally lead students to drop out. Flexibility of alternative education programs is important. These nontraditional programs should exist as part of the many options that can meet the needs of…

This paper presents and discusses data based on the perceptions of 128 persistent school absentees on their initial and continued reasons for missing school. The findings suggest that a greater proportion of the students were inclined to blame their institutions, rather than social or psychological factors, for their behavior. (SSH)

A Minnesota study examined the secondary school dropout problem from the perspective of both the education system and the employment/training system. Findings from a pilot study involving 24 public secondary schools and the 24 counterpart Comprehensive Employment and Training Act agencies were compared with information from national and state…

Traces strategies for preventing high school dropouts from the traditional reliance on remediation or incentives to recent negative sanctions (e.g., West Virginia's "no school, no drive" law). The General Educational Development Program serves those who return voluntarily to school after having realized the importance of education. (JB)

A new, prevailing wisdom is guiding the thinking of policy makers and policy shapers throughout North America; its watchwords are "global competitiveness" and "economic restructuring." The preoccupation with viewing schooling and its role in society through the single lens of global economic competitiveness closes off other…