The Vocational Counseling Project was undertaken to provide secondary-level handicapped students, who were identified as possible dropouts, with vocational counseling and support to facilitate post-high school adjustment. In addition, project staff were supposed to determine the readiness of secondary-level handicapped students for work placement,…

In July and August 1989 the Delaware-Chenango Board of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) piloted the Summer Telelearning for Academic Renewal (STAR) program, a telecommunications-based program aimed at reducing the potential for at-risk eighth graders to drop out of school. Students were selected for the program by their home schools on the…

In 1989, a study was conducted at Southwestern Community College (SCC) to determine the percentage of students who by-passed the remedial classes into which they had been placed, and the effect of this on their progress at SCC. A random sample of 180 students who failed all or part of the placement test administered in 1988-89 were chosen as the…

A summer employment and training project for high school dropouts was conducted at Florida's Pensacola Junior College (PJC) through the college's Adult High School. The program participants were economically disadvantaged teenagers who were eligible for Job Training Partnership Act funding. All but four of the 20 participants were high school…

In September, 1989, the President and the nation's governors held what they called an "Education Summit" in Charlottesville, Virginia. They declared that they would establish national goals for education. Following the summit, a communique was issued listing goals in seven areas: (1) the readiness of children to start school; (2)…

This paper describes a program to provide educational and employment services to high school dropouts and unemployed adults in seven rural Tennessee counties. The program offers supplemental services and coordinates job development and placement with Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) administrative personnel. Program activities include basic…

Overall, federal and state tax codes treat employer investments in human capital more favorably than investment in physical plant and equipment. The most important advantage is that training expenditures can be dispensed immediately, rather than depreciated over time, possibly resulting in a subsidy of 33 percent. In addition, employers who use…

This report describes the work of a college-wide committee on enrollment management appointed in the spring of 1988 at Arapahoe Community College (ACC), in Colorado, to investigate causes of student attrition. Chapter 1 lists the main points considered by the committee in their research, including a definition of student persistence, the…

This paper discusses a study of at-risk students in two highly contrastive schools, located in different districts, in order to illustrate the comparative perspective on how district and school characteristics might influence the definition of and response to at-risk students. The study is linked with a larger cultural context through an…

This paper addresses the educational implications of the increasing number of students at risk and reviews the variety of at-risk conditions and circumstances and their indicators. The following topics are discussed: (1) the characteristics and behaviors that define and identify youth at risk; (2) social correlates of educational risk; (3)…

An Education Writers Association seminar in Atlanta focused on the link between illiteracy and the workplace in the South. State economic development policies are largely bypassing rural areas, and the effects of this urban-rural split include persistent high poverty rates, population loss, and unemployment. Changes in the workplace, particularly…

Pursuant to a mandate and funding from the Ontario Ministry of Education, the Board of Education for the City of London, Ontario developed the London Project in which they implemented the philosophy of "invitational education" (Purkey and Novak, 1984) to address the problem of secondary school students dropping out before graduation.…

Drug and alcohol abuse and teenage pregnancy are two behaviors manifested by at-risk children that are both a cause and a result of their lack of success in school and possible subsequent dropping out. The distinction between substance use and abuse may be determined using the following criteria: (1) age of onset; (2) physiological responses; (3)…

A study assessed the pilot phase of a program called New Chance, which offers intensive, comprehensive, long-term services to young mothers, 17 to 21 years old, all of whom are poor and most of whom are welfare recipients and high school dropouts. Program services, which center on education, occupational skills training, parenting and health…

This interim evaluation compares the initiation, design, and curriculum of two school-based "academy" programs in Oakland (California) high schools and examines their links to the school district and the business community. The academy model of schools-within-a-school originated in Philadelphia. The Health Academy at Oakland Technical…