A Comparison of Dropouts and Nondropouts on Participation in School Activities

Abstract

This study investigated the relationship of participation in the extraclass activities and dropouts in Kansas high schools of varying enrollments. Schools were chosen at random in each enrollment category with approximately equal number of students. A questionnaire was used to secure data on the dropouts and an equal number of nondropouts. The t ratio and analysis of variance were used with a .01 level of confidence.

The results show that lack of participation in school activities is a characteristic of the dropout in each enrollment category with 68 percent of the total being nonparticipators as opposed to only 4 percent of the nondropouts. Participation by dropouts was similar in all sizes of schools except in the smallest enrollment where a larger participation was noted.     

The demand for student loans in higher education: A study of preferences and attitudes

This empirical study examined postsecondary-student attitudes and preferences regarding five discrete student loan plans and loan plan features. Certain demographic variables were examined for their relationship to student attitudes toward the various loan plans. The study addressed the following questions: What debt ceiling do students identify as acceptable? Are students willing to indebt themselves over an extended time span? What percent of annual income do they feel reasonably can be applied to loan repayment? Will students alter their repayment plan choices given additional and more detailed information about loan options? A random sample of 218 recipients of federal higher education loans during the 1973–74 academic year was drawn from the population of 6,765 undergraduate borrowers at the University Park Campus of the Pennsylvania State University.     

远程学习者辍学影响因素的追踪对比研究

本研究以某省级电大2010年春季入学的英语专业本科生为研究样本,对其进行追踪调查,对比分析了第一学期和第二学期辍学生在个人背景、学习情况及辍学原因上的异同。研究数据通过网上调查问卷和深度访谈的方式获得,并在"远程教育辍学归因框架"下,使用量化统计和质性研究工具Nvivo 8.0进行编码和分析。研究发现,第二学期的辍学生比之前者,尽管学习目标更加明确,英语基础较好,学习投入更多,但其努力程度依然有限,加之课程难度增加,学校教学支持服务又不到位,使其在工学矛盾等环境因素的刺激下最终做出辍学的决定。与第一学期相比,导致辍学的因素更趋多样化,且激烈程度大为降低;隶属于远程教育机构的因素在辍学影响中发挥着更大的作用。     

Age Distribution in the Grades as a Measure of Mentality

Abstract

A study was made to determine whether or not there was a significant correlation between a student’s academic standing in a course and the time when the student withdrew from the course. Students considered withdrawers, rather than dropouts, were those who quit a course before the end of a term but continued in good standing in other courses. In this study of fourteen courses with high withdrawal (W) rates, taught by five different community college teachers, the researcher found that half of all grades assigned were W-grades. The withdrawers resembled the dropouts in the literature in that the time of departure was related to academic standing.     

Sitting next to a dropout: Academic success of students with more educated peers

We investigate the impact of the presence of university dropouts on the academic success of first-time students in universities of applied sciences. Our identification strategy relies on quasi-random variation in the proportion of dropouts. The estimated average zero effect of dropouts on first-time students’ success masks treatment heterogeneity and non-linearities. First, we find negative effects on the academic success of their new peers from dropouts who had re-enrolled in the same subject and, conversely, positive effects of dropouts changing subjects. Second, we use causal machine learning methods to find that the effects vary nonlinearly with different treatment intensities and prevailing treatment levels.     

论电大开放教育中流生现象的负面影响——以宁波电大英语专业（本科）为例

本文针对宁波电大开放教育英语专业学生流失的现象,分析了这种现象导致的一些危害,包括对学习者自身,对辍学者周围的同学,对担任教学任务的教师,对所在的办学机构,乃至对社会和国家造成的一些负面影响。希望能用具体的事实对辍学者和求学者起到警示的作用,以期遏制或者减少流生现象的发展．     

他们为什么放弃学业——宁波电大远程开放教育英语本科辍学生访谈调查

辍学率居高不下是困扰远程开放教育发展的一个严重问题,已引起国内教育界人士的普遍关注。研究者以宁波广播电视大学英语本科2010年春季入学的58名学生作为样本,一学期后辍学者共10人,研究者邀请到其中的4人以及他们的专业教师和班主任进行了面对面或电话访谈。基于以上调查,研究揭示了远程开放教育英语专业学习者辍学的影响因素,并提出了降低辍学率的几点建议。     

Vertically integrated skill development and vocational training for socioeconomically marginalised youth: The experience at Gram Tarang and Centurion University,India

At present, India’s education system turns out millions of young people who are ready to think, but not enough people with entrepreneurial or employment skills. As India faces increasing limits on its resources, both economic and natural, the competency and capability of human resources play a pivotal role in developing and sustaining the economy. The sector of skill development and vocational education requires a paradigm shift, from a static framework to one that is dynamic and constantly adapting to meet industry and social demands. Centurion University of Technology and Management has evolved to provide relevant and inclusive education to young people at every level, from school dropouts to graduates. Through its social entrepreneurship initiative, Gram Tarang Employability Training Services, Centurion partners with industries and the government to develop the capacity for employment and entrepreneurship in all its students and trainees. This article describes Centurion’s vision, operational approach, and the underlying beliefs that guide its innovative thinking, based on its years of working in some of India’s most marginalised and underdeveloped regions.     

Quality assessment for placement centres: a case study of the University of Barcelona’s faculty of education

The aim of this research was to identify the factors that could be used for quality assessments of the placement centres used by the University of Barcelona’s Faculty of Education. To achieve this, a multiple case study method (bachelor’s degrees in Education, Social Education and Social Work) was used, which was based on a survey methodology. A questionnaire, which identified seven quality criteria, was applied to 291 placement centres. An analysis of the placement centres’ average quality scores revealed that most of them had high scores for consideration of the training activity, tutor–student ratio, type of placement, capacity of providing career opportunities, the centre’s tutoring, the tutors’ tasks and the coverage of the competences. We considered it necessary to improve the definition of quality placement plans, and the recognition of the tutor’s work at the centre; therefore, this paper proposes an instrument to measure and assess the quality indicators described, aiming at improving the placements system at the University by better connecting universities and centres.     

A Model for Creating Engaged Land-Grant Universities: Penn State’s Engagement Ladder Model

The original mission of the state and land-grant university was to engage with communities to solve problems and improve the quality of life for the citizenry. Today most state and land-grant universities have moved far away from their original mission and are struggling to become engaged with the communities they serve. In this case study, we highlight some of the steady progress toward engagement that has recently occurred at The Pennsylvania State University. We catalogue how strong vision and leadership; infrastructure reorganization; and the active involvement of faculty, students, and community partners have revitalized the land-grant mission at Penn State. Keith R. Aronson is the Assistant Director of the Social Science Research Institute and the Children, Youth, and Families Consortium, The Pennsylvania State University. Dr. Aronson received his B.A. from Rutgers University, M.A. from Ball State University, and Ph.D. from The Pennsylvania State University. He is a clinical psychologist with a specialization in biobehavioral health and is interested in understanding how research conducted at universities and colleges can better impact communities. Nicole Webster is Assistant Professor of Agricultural and Extension Education, The Pennsylvania State University. Dr. Webster received her B.A. from the University of Florida and her M.A. and Ph.D. from Michigan State University. Her special interest is in service-learning research, particularly among minority youth.     

Another look at college student’s ratings of course quality: data from Penn State student surveys in three settings

This study assessed the relationships of student attributes, course characteristics and course outcomes to college students’ ratings of course quality in three types of settings. The analysis utilised data from online surveys of samples of college students conducted in 2011 and 2012 at the Pennsylvania State University. Included in the analysis were: (1) 1805 students at the main campus; (2) 1453 students at 19 smaller satellite campus locations of the university scattered across the state; and (3) 522 students participating in online degree programmes through Penn State’s World Campus. Students were asked to rate the quality of instruction they received in a randomly selected course in which they had been enrolled during the previous semester, and to respond to a number of questions about the course, the instructor’s behaviour and themselves. The relationships of these factors to how students rated the course were assessed for subjects in the three study settings. In all three settings, student and course characteristics, course difficulty and amount of required work had little effect on course ratings. Grade received was modestly related to course rating. However, instructor’s use of selected recommended pedagogical practices and students’ perceptions of how much they felt they learned were by far the strongest correlates of students’ course evaluations. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

Doing poststructural ethnography in the life history of dropouts in South Korea: methodological ruminations on subjectivity,positionality and reflexivity

This paper addresses the issue of positionality in researching the researcher’s own culture and discusses its epistemological implications. Drawing on the researcher’s own field experience in which she entered teenage cultural space, this paper is an attempt at a self‐reflexive analysis of the relationships between the researcher and the participants (teenage youths, former dropouts). In so doing, it aims to discuss the methodological significance of the researcher’s subjectivity, positionality and reflexivity. The paper unpacks the researcher’s journey with first‐person voices, intending to illuminate a poststructural thesis regarding the knower’s implicatedness, multiple and shifting subjectivities, and the negotiated and situationally contingent nature of stories.     

智能化环境中基于学习分析的学习行为优化研究

学习环境的智能化已成为主流趋势,如何合理运用学习分析技术挖掘并分析其中的学生学习行为数据,优化学生学习行为、激发其学习主动性,是在线教育领域值得关注的课题。为此,基于对学习行为文献的分析,从数据采集与存储、行为分析、反馈与提醒、智能化行为优化、智能引擎等五个方面,构建了学习行为优化模型,并将模型运用于湖南S大学《信息技术与课程整合》课程的智慧教学实践中,依托智慧教学平台获取并分析学生学习行为数据,再针对具体情景采取合理的学习行为优化措施。研究结果表明,经过这一优化,不仅有效提升了学生认知维度的学习成绩、强化了互动维度的学习互动;而且提高了时效维度的学习任务完成率、强化了参与维度的学习积极性和参与性。     

The role of lesson analysis in pre-service teacher education: an empirical investigation of teacher learning from a virtual video-based field experience

A video-based program on lesson analysis for pre-service mathematics teachers was implemented for two consecutive years as part of a teacher education program at the University of Lazio, Italy. Two questions were addressed: What can preservice teachers learn from the analysis of videotaped lessons? How can preservice teachers’ analysis ability, and its improvement, be measured? Two groups of preservice teachers (approximately 140 in total) participated in the program. A three-step lesson analysis framework was applied to three lesson videos: (1) goal(s) and parts of the lesson; (2) student learning; and, (3) teaching alternatives. Preservice teachers’ ability to analyze lessons was measured through an open-ended pre- and post-assessment. In the assessment, preservice teachers were asked to mark and comment on events (in a lesson not included in the program) that they found interesting for: teachers’ actions/decisions; students’ behavior/learning; and, mathematical content. A coding system was developed based on five criteria: elaboration, mathematics content, student learning, critical approach, and alternative strategies. In both studies, the ability to analyze instruction improved significantly on all five criteria. These data suggest promising directions for the development of both an instrument to measure lesson analysis abilities and a model for teacher learning.     

Effects of Analysis and Evaluation Questions on Various Levels of Achievement

This study investigated whether a dominant use of analysis and evaluation questions in social studies text-type materials would improve various levels of sixth grader’s social studies achievement. Sixth grade pupils numbering 260 in eleven classes were randomly assigned by class to either experimental Condition A or B. During a 4-week experimental period, pupils in each condition used specially prepared materials. Condition A’s materials contained a dominant emphasis of analysis and evaluation questions (47. 53 percent), while Condition B’s materials utilized primarily knowledge questions (87. 38 percent). At the experiment’s termination, an achievement test was administered that provided six sub-scores, one for each level of Bloom’s Taxonomy. ANACOVA was the principal method of analysis . Students in Condition A achieved significantly better in the area of evaluation than did students in Condition B. Reading significantly affected all sub-scores with better readers performing at higher levels than poorer readers. The use of analysis and evaluation questions produced significantly greater scores in the area of evaluation than did the use of knowledge questions. Better readers in both conditions achieved significantly higher than did poorer readers in all six areas of the achievement test.     

A Technique for the Construction of a Teacher-Training Curriculum

ABSTRACT

Historically, students who fail to graduate from secondary school are considered as a single category of school dropouts. However, emerging literature indicates that there may be multiple subgroups of high school dropouts, termed a dropout typology. The authors’ purpose was to assess the extent to which a typology of dropouts was present in a large national dataset and to estimate the influence of the known covariates of dropping out on each of the subgroups. A growth mixture model was estimated using the Education Longitudinal Study 2002 (National Center for Education Statistics, n.d.) dataset and noncumulative grade point average during the first 3 semesters of high school. The model identified 2 main subgroups associated with dropping out, which accounted for 24.6% of the sample but contained 91.8% of the dropouts.     

Young adults who re‐enter Australian high schools and drop out again

A survey of 1233 Australian school dropouts who re‐entered high school examined the characteristics associated with their subsequent continuation or departure from school. A suite of socioeducational factors was found to correlate with students who were unsuccessful in their reentry attempts. These repeat dropouts exhibited disproportionately as ‘homeless’, as having experienced unemployment, and as being less educationally and occupationally ambitious than those who remain enrolled in their courses. They were more likely to be enrolled at traditional high schools rather than innovative secondary colleges, and to be experiencing practical, interpersonal and discipline‐related problems whilst at school. Discriminant analysis indicated that re‐entry student dropout was most parsimoniously predicted by three factors: extent of interpersonal conflict, educational aspirations and type of school. Implications for the identification and retention of re‐entry students are discussed.     

Anatomical Sciences Education Vol. 6, Issue 1, 2013 Cover Image

ON THE COVER: Gross anatomy lecture c. 1888 delivered by Joseph Leidy, M.D., LL.D., (1823‐1891), Professor of Anatomy at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Leidy, a founder and first president (1899‐1889) of the American Association of Anatomists, received a Doctor of Medicine degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1844 and in 1886 he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Learning and Laws degree by Harvard University. According to the University of Pennsylvania catalogue for the 1886/1887 academic year, the course in anatomy for medical students consisted of 3 lectures and 10 hours of practical anatomy classes with an additional 2 lectures per week of topographical anatomy.     

远程开放教育英语专业学习者辍学现象调查(一)——来自电大系统14个省级电大样本观测点的实证研究

高辍学率是远程开放教育不可回避的一个问题。本研究对广播电视大学辍学率较高的英语专业展开实证研究,研究首先选择英语专业招生较集中的广播电视大学系统14个省级电大作为样本观测点,进而确定各观测点2010年春入学的2237名学生进入研究与学业观察范围,研究计划连续跟踪该届学生3个学期,记录每学期发生的辍学现象。到2010年秋季,研究得到了入学半年后首批辍学者名单共204人,研究者邀请到其中的118人填写了调查问卷,并对其中98名辍学者进行了面对面访谈或者电话、网络访谈。研究同时得到了195名辍学者在校学习成绩记录。研究还对辍学者身边的40名英语专业教师以及班主任进行了面对面访谈。基于以上数据,研究揭示了远程开放教育英语专业学生学习半年后发生的辍学现象及其影响因素,并提出了远程教育机构作为方向的思考。     

Basic education in China’s rural areas: a legal obligation or an individual choice?

This study takes a close look at the whole cycle of the 9-yr compulsory education in two communities in north China. It reveals that although there are nearly 100% enrolment and completion rates at the primary level, dropouts constitute a serious problem at the secondary level, thus rendering the 9-yr compulsory schooling an unfinished cycle. Through interviewing 30 dropouts’ families and using rational choice theory as a theoretical framework, the study concludes that the current landscape of rural schooling in the area studied is a result of local people’s rational choices rather than that of the compulsory educational law.