One-year dropout rates confound changing student composition and movement through high school, unlike cohort rates¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · design r2 · q2
Currency · newest study 2001 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? The one-year dropout rate mixes together composition and progression changes because it does not distinguish new from continuing students. → Elaine Allensworth and John Q. Easton 2001

Evidence¶

Elaine Allensworth and John Q. Easton 2001¶

Elaine Allensworth and John Q. Easton. (2001). Calculating a Cohort Dropout Rate for the Chicago Public Schools: A Technical Research Report. Consortium on Chicago School Research. https://consortium.uchicago.edu/publications/calculating-cohort-dropout-rate-chicago-public-schools

q2 · i? · design · r2

Methodological argument comparing the CPS one-year rate (15–17 percent of high school students per year, Table 3) with cohort rates. The one-year rate's advantage of being up to date is outweighed, the authors argue, by these confounds; no statistical test is involved.

"These trends are mixed together in the one-year dropout rate because it does not distinguish between new and continuing students."

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Defining dropout cohorts by age 13 rather than by ninth-grade entry avoids composition bias from the CPS promotion policy's grade retentions — related
• After controlling for demographic changes and school enrollment patterns, the postpolicy decline in dropout rates appears slightly smaller, and the report urges caution in attributing trends to the gate — related
• Including unverified transfers as dropouts yields dropout rates about 4 percent higher at age 19 and eliminates the downward trend — related