ITHACA, N.Y. -- In a comprehensive study finds that an average increase in stricter high school graduation requirements results in a 3 to 7 percent jump in the dropout rate. The Cornell University and University of Michigan economists who conducted the study say this translates to between 26,000 and 65,000 more high school dropouts a year nationwide.
"We can't judge whether this increase is significant enough to prompt administrators to reconsider higher standards. But they do need to be aware of what the other side of the equation is when they institute more stringent graduation requirements," says Dean R. Lillard, an economist and research associate in the Department of Policy Analysis and Management at Cornell. Lillard and Philip P. DeCicca, Cornell B.S. '93, and now a research associate at the University of Michigan, conducted five different analyses to draw their conclusions.
"The results strongly suggest that state-mandated minimum course requirements cause students to drop out of high school," says Lillard. "In all cases, we find that higher course graduation requirements are associated with higher attrition rates, higher dropout rates and higher individual probabilities of dropping out.
"This study provides the first empirical evidence to confirm the old adage that there's no free lunch, For every incremental increase in standards, you're going to see more dropouts," Lillard says. "Just what the individual and social costs are have not yet been established but they could include poorer jobs, lower lifetime earnings and lower self-esteem for the dropouts."
Since the 1983 report of the National Commission on Excellence in Education, A Nation at Risk, and later President George Bush's call for raising high school graduation requirements, known as Goals 2000, many states have "raised the bar" for graduation. Presumably, the benefit to high school graduates is a better education, better jobs and higher earnings. But Lillard and DeCicca report in a study to be published in a forthcoming issue of the Economics of Education Review, that by raising the standards, by requiring 2.5 more courses spread over the four years of high school (a "typical" increase in standards, or a standard deviation in the existing number of units), an additional 26,000 to 65,000 students will drop out (depending on which analysis is used).
The researchers analyzed state-level data on dropout rates from the 1980 and 1990 U.S. Census and data on public school attrition rates from 1980 to 1994 from The Digest of Education Statistics issued by the U.S. Department of Education. Data on individual dropout decisions came from the base-year and follow-up waves of the High School and Beyond Surveys and the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988. Both surveys were done under the direction of the National Center for Education Statistics.
"For the first time, we have hard evidence that more marginal students will drop out if you raise the standards," DeCicca added. "Policy-makers need to be aware of these potential consequences when they decide to raise standards."
Lillard said more research is needed, but with concrete evidence that shows higher standards put more students at risk of dropping out, states may look for more ways to identify students at risk and consider instituting or adapting existing programs to support students before they drop out.
The College of Human Ecology at Cornell and the American Education Research Association provided funding for the study.
Related World Wide Web sites: The following sites provide additional information on this news release. Some might not be part of the Cornell University community, and Cornell has no control over their content or availability.
-- For information on Dean Lillard,
http://www.human.cornell.edu/faculty/facultybio.cfm?netid=drl3&facs=1
-- For information on the Department of Policy Analysis and Management:
http://www.human.cornell.edu/units/PAM/index.cfm
Journal
Economics of Education Review