Target Interventions to High-Need Students and Schools

What Can Policymakers Do?

• Identify and support at-risk students. Early Warning Data Systems use student-level data to identify struggling students who need help. Once these students are identified, prevention resources can be targeted to districts, schools and individual students with greater precision. Additionally, data can be used on the back end to measure the cost-benefits of dropout prevention investments.[1]

• Invest in dropout recovery strategies. Dropout recovery consists of efforts to bring back high school dropouts and provide them with a variety of services, with the goal being a high school diploma or GED as well as other indications of college readiness. In the new economy, individuals who fail to graduate from high school face bleak futures. Even with increased attention to dropout prevention, some students will still fall through the cracks. For years, the General Educational Development (GED) certificate has served as an alternative option for non-graduates. However, individuals with traditional diplomas have better labor market outcomes than those with GEDs, and recent research suggests that the GED may actually contribute to the dropout problem. States can adopt policies that encourage non-completers to return to school and offer alternative routes to earning an authentic high school diploma.

• Target dropout factories for aggressive interventions. The 2,000 “dropout factories” nationwide are mostly concentrated in northern and western cities, southern and southwestern states and three large urban districts—New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles. Data show that currently, close to one in five students attends a dropout factory, but among minority students, the rate is nearly one in two. While individual supports to students are necessary, policymakers must address the systemic challenges at the school, district and state levels to turn the curve for students in these schools.