Full Report - Center for Collaborative Education

High dropout rates among Boston Public School
students have been of concern for some time, and
in 2004 Boston was ranked among the 35 U.S.
cities with the highest dropout rates (Balfanz &
Letgers, 2004), signaling a public recognition of the
crisis. In the last decade, significant attention has
been placed on maintaining students in schools and
even recovering those who have dropped out.
Several subsequent research and policy studies
focused on the dropout rate and the dropouts. For
example, a report by the Boston Youth Transitions
Task Force (2006) documented that over a third
of BPS high school students drop out of school
and that among those who drop out there is an
over-representation of youth of color, of males,
of students facing major life situations, and of
students experiencing great challenges in school
(for example, being an English learner, failing the
MCAS, and being retained in grade). The Parthenon
Group (2007), in a study commissioned by
the district, reported that one of the groups most
susceptible to dropping out were “late‐entrant
ELLs,” defined as English language learners who
entered BPS for the first time during high school
(p. 9). Others considered at high risk were special
education students, those who entered high school
over-age, those with low performance in middle
school courses and MCAS tests, and students with
very low attendance rates (less than 80%).
In 2009, the Gastón Institute and the Center for
Collaborative Education focused on the dropout
rates of English language learners as part of their
study of enrollment and educational outcomes of
ELLs in Boston Public Schools following the implementation
of the educational policy changes required
by Referendum Question 2. They found that
the annual high school dropout rate had doubled
(from 6.3% to 12.0%) in the first three years after
the implementation of the policy change (Tung et
al., 2009). Before the implementation of the law,
the dropout rate of students in ELL programs was
lower than those of English proficient students
in general education programs; this was reversed
after the implementation. Among some language
groups –Haitian Creole speakers, for example– the
dropout rate had tripled in that period (Uriarte et
al., 2009).
Researchers have focused on the factors that lead
students to drop out of school. Berkold, Geis, and
Kaufman (1998, as quoted in Rumberger, 2006)
used dropouts’ answers in the National Educa-
tion Longitudinal Study and reported that 77%
mentioned school-related reasons, 34% mentioned
family-related reasons, and 32% mentioned workrelated
reasons. Rumberger (2006) focused his
review of the dropout research on the individual
and institutional factors that have been associated
with dropping out. Among the individual factors
considered are poor academic achievement, poor
engagement (indicated by low levels of attendance
and high suspensions, for example), residential
and school mobility, retention in grade, pregnancy,
and employment. Student background characteristics
such as gender (male), race (of color), and
language proficiency are also part of the individual
factors that affect dropping out (Rumberger, 2006;
Swanson et al., 2006). Among the institutional factors
considered are family factors (such as parental
education and income, family structure, parental involvement
in schooling) and school factors (student
composition, school resources, policies that lead to
involuntary and voluntary withdrawals from school,
and high-stakes testing regimes) (Jacob, 2001;
National Research Council, 1999; Rumberger,1995,
2006; Rumberger & Palardy, 2005; Rumberger &
Thomas, 2000). 1
In this chapter, after an assessment of the dropout
rates of LEP students in Boston, we examine the
annual dropout rate of LEP students of different
characteristics and of those participating in different
types of programs. Finally, we assess the relationship
between key indicators such as attendance,
suspensions, and retention on the dropout rate
of LEP students in Boston. Other tables related to
these topics appear in Appendix 2.
A What Are the Annual High School
Dropout Rates of English Language
Learners? How Do Their Rates
Compare to Those of English
Proficient Students? How Have
the Annual High School Dropout
Rates of LEP Students Changed
through Time?
In this section we begin to analyze annual high
school dropout rates among ELLs in Boston Public
Schools by comparing their rates to those of
English proficient students and examine the trend
in the high school dropout rates for LEP students
in Boston. Table 21 presents the SY2009 annual
Improving Educational Outcomes of English Language Learners in Schools and Programs in Boston Public Schools 49