Pathways to School Dropout

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Pathways to School DropoutIan M. Evans a & Adria DiBenedetto ba Department of Psychology, SUNY at Binghamton, Binghamton, NY13901b State University of New York at BinghamtonPublished online: 23 Oct 2008.

To cite this article: Ian M. Evans & Adria DiBenedetto (1991) Pathways to School Dropout, SpecialServices in the Schools, 6:1-2, 63-80, DOI: 10.1300/J008v06n01_04

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Pathways to School Dropout: A Conceptual Model for Early Prevention

Ian M. Evans Adria DiBenedetto

State University of New York at Binghamton

ABSTRACT. In order to develop individual or systems-wide interventions for the primary prevent~on of school dropout, it would be helpful to have a conceptual model that focuses on the interaction between the school and those pupils considered at risk. By analyzing the interaction patterns that lead up to early school leaving, dropout can be seen as a behavior, not a predetermined characteristic of certain students. Four broad "pathways" are proposed; these are not causal explanations, but types of developmental progression for which school dropout is a likely eventual outcome. The model discussed herein has implications for generating pracfical strategies to prevent school failure in individual pupils, and offers s ecial services providers a rationale for supportmg better define programmatic school reforms and policies.

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Recently, there has been much professional interest in those students who, to use the Federal definition of dropout, "fail to gradu-

Preparation of this article was supported by a grant from the New York State Education Department's Stay-in-School Partnership Project. I t was completed while the senior author was a Visiting Fellow in the Department of Psychology, University of Otago, New Zealand, and the junior author was a Jacob K. Javits Fellow. Special thanks are due to both programs for their support, and to Dennis Hughes, Principal of North East Valley Normal School, Dunedin, NZ, for criti- cally reviewing an earlier draft. Requests for reprints should be directed to: Ian M. Evans, Department of Psychology, SUNY at Binghamton, Binghamton, NY 13901.

Special Services in the Schools, Vol. 6(1/2) 1990 O 1990 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved. 63

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64 SPECUL SERVICES IN THE SCHOOLS

ate or complete a program of studies by the maximum age established by a State" (U.S. General Accounting Office, 1986). Concern over the dropout problem is often related to its economic impact on a society so dependent upon a well-educated work force. Equally disconcerting are the detrimental effects on those minority groups for whom the dropout rate is unusually high, and concomi- tant societal problems like juvenile crime and drug abuse (Natriello, 1986). There are programs that have successfully encouraged early leavers to return as well as programs that have kept at school students considered very high risk for failure. However, entry to such programs is typically preceded by long histories of academic or behavioral difficulties, so that it would seem preferable to expend more energy on early prevention.

Rational as this suggestion may appear, there are significant complications with prevention as a school-based strategy. The ma- jor obstacle is that preventative tactics presuppose sufficient knowledge of the causes of dropout, the nature of the phenomenon, and factors that allow prediction of risk. The purpose of this article is to provide an overview of these issues and to present a conceptual model for early prevention of school dropout. We will examine the possibilities from the perspective of psychological practice, adopt- ing a developmental and interactional approach.

DEVELOPMENTAL INTERACTIONS AS PATHWAYS

There are fascinating parallels between dropout and psychological difficulties experienced by children. In some ways, dropping out of school is the educational counterpart to the emotional and social problems usually coming to .the attention of mental health practitioners. These parallel perspectives have interesting implications for prevention. For instance, if one cause of school dropout is teenage pregnancy, then clearly prevention needs to be focused on psychological factors related both to early sexual activity and inade- quate contraceptive practices. Conversely, if poor school performance precipitates low self-esteem, alienation, and interpersonal difficulties, then improving academic success and school completion may be a preventative strategy for psychopathology (cf. Blech- man, McEnroe, Carella, & Audette, 1986).

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Ian M. Evam and Adria DiBenedetfo 65

Given the interdependence of psychological and educational factors, dropping out can be conceptualized as the endpoint of a developing relationship between the individual child and the school system. Although the term "dropout" is widely used as a noun, we are not interested in trying to categorize and identify a certain type of child, but in predicting the behavior of dropping out, which may have closely related activities (e.g., missing classes, not paying attention, being tardy) as precursors. This approach is comparable to predicting the behavior of child abuse rather than trying to identify a hypothetical group of individuals who are "child abusers" (Du- banoski, Evans, & Higuchi, 1978). It recognizes that any student might, under certain circumstances, drop out of school. In order to predict a behavior, rather than identify a certain type of child, i t is necessary to consider developmental progressions- these are what we refer to as pathways. Since there can be an infinite number of individual patterns, the four general categories proposed here should help to organize the myriad of unique configurations.

To be useful, a conceptual model should guide intervention deci- sions, so the implications for practice need to be made clear. Be- cause of this perspective, we will not attempt to develop an exhaus- tive model that integrates everything known about social factors causative of school failure. Poverty, family dissolution, educational philosophies, response to deviance, and many other considerations enter into the ultimate equation. Broad generalizations, however, rarely specify mutable policy reforms for school districts; Levin (1986), for instance, relates dropout to being disadvantaged and argues that more than a third of all school students are in this category. Our scope is limited to what it is that schools-and special services professionals within schaols-might actually do to prevent pupils from dropping out, independent of societal problems.

Other supposed causes of dropping out do not necessarily help to isolate individual prevention strategies. For instance, researchers have asked students who have dropped out why they did so. Yet, work in cognitive psychology has shown that people do not have true access to such causes (Nisbett & Ross, 1980). Not that students' perceptions are uninteresting. They could indeed supply information regarding possible pathways. However, they represent causes to which students attribute their behavior, not the causes

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66 SPECIAL SERVICES IN THE SCHOOLS

themselves. Considering the progressions to dropout suggests prac- tical ways by which detours, bypasses, and new pathways may be developed.

THE BEHAVIOR OF DROPPING OUT

There is surprisingly little information on dropout behavior per se. There are no clear answers to even such basic questions as the difference between a student who is enrolled in school but spends fewer and fewer days actually in attendance, versus a student who consciously chooses not to enroll. The degree to which dropping out is a student's active decision has implications for prediction. There is considerable disparity between deciding to drop out and a more chance happenstance, since students who have made a decision are more likely to identify themselves as "dropouts" rather than someone not in school. It is also possible that a student who is still enrolled may view nonattendance as a temporary state. How- ever, returning to school could prove more difficult than antici- pated, and the perception of being enrolled may reduce guilt or satisfy a parent, but provide an inefficient safety net.

Another consideration is the alternative behavior that fills the day. School is unique in that, for most children, it occupies a vast amount of time. If not participating in school, one must be engaging in some other activity. Sometimes these options are simply mare reinforcing than school attendance, so the explanation for not going to school must be found in the incentive value of the competing behaviors. If a teenager is offered a reasonable job, for example, factors related to dropping out become such variables as delay of gratification - assuming that graduating from high school does en- hance job prospects. Thus we have to consider beliefs about future events, expectations about later job opportunities, and appraisal of the likelihood of graduating. These factors may enter into a formal decision to accept employment, especially in high unemployment areas where graduating does not affect opportunity. If so, prevention could involve such tactics as persuading local employers to offer jobs to teenagers contingent upon their maintaining satisfactory performance in school. Work-study programs and creating flexible alternative school hours are also examples of this type of

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Ian M. Evans and Adria DiBenedetto 67

intervention, so that alternative involvements need not be incompat- ible with going to school.

Sometimes, the alternatives available are not reinforcing at all to the student. However, school becomes sufficiently aversive to the individual that almost anything else is preferable. "Hanging out" at electronic game arcades might be an example. At a very general level, special services practitioners and other school professionals can participate in primary dropout prevention by being sensitive to messages students receive that formal education is something to dislike. These messages come from such diverse sources as parents' own dissatisfaction with school, teachers communicating their personal discontent, or cultural images that schools are negative insti- tutions (e.g., television's labeling school "the Bronx Zoo," Devine, 1987). Note that school may be equally aversive for other students whose attendance is satisfactory. Thus, an important vari- able in completion must be the personal or familial factors that per- suade a student to attend school. Such causes of resilience may be the expressed values of parents, peers, and teachers (given that one can detest algebra but like one's math teacher). Primary dropout prevention can be aided by finding out more about why students are staying in, not why they are dropping out.

A closely related facet of dropout behavior is not just that school has become aversive to the student but that the student has become aversive to the school. Suspension and expulsion are both deliberate procedures for dealing with students whose behavior is unaccepta- ble or unmanageable. These tactics constitute another important causal mechanism for dropout behavior as an entity. Suspension permits students to practice the very behavior we are trying to prevent - not coming to school.

A final behavioral consideration is that dropping out may be a collateral component of some other cluster. This is particularly likely if not attending school is the primary behavior to predict and dropout is some formalization of it-a moment in time when the status changes from poor attender to non-student. Not attending school could be part of a pattern of many problem areas, particularly psychological disorders such as schizophrenia or depression. Adolescent depression has as concomitants, apathy, difficulty in getting up, fatigue as a result of sleep loss, and so on. Thus, some

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dropout behavior represents a component of another pattern that is not-detected.

School dropout is not a unitary phenomenon when considered from the point of view of behavior. The diversity of patterns is an important consideration when designing prevention, since it deter- mines the variety of possible targets for intervention. Of special importance is the developmental nature of the patterns, so that events occur which then set other events in motion. This snowball- ing effect is one that will have to be mapped out in order to inter- vene at critical points in time before a trend or development has moved into a less malleable phase. Of the many potential pathways, four general patterns of interaction are proposed that help organize the range of possibilities. These are: unexpected events, long-term underlying problems, early skill deficits, and entry problems. Each pathway is discussed in turn.

UNEXPECTED EVENTS

The easiest pathway to describe is the one for which prediction is extremely difficult and prevention therefore represents a special challenge. The critical attribute of the unexpected events category is that, prior to dropping out, the student has not engaged in any behavior that can be identified as a precursor. Indeed, the student may to all appearances be a model student, with acceptable grades. However, some dramatic or traumatic event takes place, either in or out of school, that results in the student being no longer able or willing to attend school. In psychopathology parlance, students are vulnerable to stressful events disrupting school participation (Gar- mezy, Masten, & Tellegen, 1984). Getting married is one common precipitant, particularly if the spouse has already left school. Be- coming pregnant and deciding to take care of the baby at home is another such event. Despite common belief that teenagers who become pregnant might have unique personality deficits, the available evidence does not support any such differences (Walters, Walters, & McKenry, 1988).

Other chance events would be incidents happening at school that result in a phenomenon akin to school phobia, for instance being attacked or threatened. A certain percentage of teenagers state they

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Ian M. Evam and Adria DiBenedetto 69

dropped out of school because they were fearful. Death of a friend or a parent might also be a precipitating event, as is marital breakup. Although potentially more predictable (since presumably it would be preceded by a history of dysfunctional family relationships), an explosive episode at home might result in a teenager pun- ishing his or-her parents by not attending school or running away. Maternal deoression has been clearlv established as a orecursor of , school difficulties and poor academic performance (Forehand & McCombs, 1988).

While traumatic events probably cannot be predicted, there are, nevertheless, implications for dropout prevention. Administrative support is needed for home-school partnerships (e.g., Comer, 1984; Evans, Bromley, &-Alden, 1989), or flexible organizational procedures for ensuring that teenagers with babies can continue to attend school. More importantly, there are two key psychological strategies: (a) promoting early success experiences which serve to immu- nize students so that later, unpredictable problems do not result in giving up on school; and (b) establishing the school itself as a rc- source for problem solving or conflict resolution.

Immunization Experiences

A good illustration of early success as prevention is provided by Gray and Ramsey'(1986). They reported that fourteen young women who had participated in a preschool early intervention program became pregnant while in high school. Eight of these students had been in the experimental group and had received intervention on school readiness and motivational skills. Seven of these eight graduated from high school despite the pregnancies. Six of the students had been in the control group and not received the early intervention. Only one of them graduated, the other five dropped out. Thus, adolescent pregnancy itself was not a factor related to school completion-"It never entered my mind not to" (p. 178) said one of the girls who graduated. Gray and Ramsey (1986) describe the "beneficent spiral" they believe developed from students entering school with better cognitive skills and greater task orientation.

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70 SPECLAL SERVICES IN THE SCHOOLS

School as a Resource

Schools can make available either direct counseling services for crises (Felner, Stilberg, & Cowen, 1975), or programs that teach effective coping and problem solving skills to more senior students before any crises develop. In the former case, it is important to evaluate counseling services in terms of their likelihood of being used by students, as well as their effectiveness in helping resolve immediate problems. In some school systems, counselors' mental health orientation attaches stigma to accessing the services. This supports the value of the alternative approach of embedding problem solving skills training in the educational experience.

There are many good examples of such skill training packages. One of the first was developed by Spivack and Shure (1974) and most subsequent programs bear a close resemblance to these pio- neering efforts. Usually, focus is on developing a variety of possible courses of action to solve a problem, weighing the pros and cons, and selecting the most rational solution. As problem solving skills suitable for the elementary school might not be adequate for the more varied challenges of middle school, instruments assessing students' knowledge of general strategies (see Elias, Rothbaum, & Gara, 1986) are useful. While in one sense the school system cannot be responsible for chance events that precipitate emotional crises in students, i t can be held accountable for fostering fundamental skills to enable a student to cope effectively.

LONG-TERM UNDERLYING PROBLEMS

The second pathway is when thexdudent, at a young age, does not appear to have any detectable psychological difficulties. How- ever, the student gradually develops certain problems which themselves lead to dropout. Examples are students who acquire gender identity problems in adolescence, who become members of a gang, or who begin to use drugs on a regular basis. In the latter case especially, dropping out of school is a secondary consequence of the primary problem. The student might be academically successful, enjoying school, and relating well to other children. But, coup-

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led with the freedoms and stresses of adolescence, such a pupil can begin to experiment with drugs, change social circles, become involved in illicit activities, and eventually drop out of school. Drug abuse leads to dropout for many reasons. The individual must seek work or steal to maintain the addiction, the frequent abuse of chem- ical substances interferes with academic performance, and drug use affects physical health.

In this second pathway, dropping out of school is a byproduct of some other more central psychological dysfunction. Suggestive personality characteristics such as thrill seeking or strong affiliation needs may be detectable early in the child's school career, but not necessarily so. The defining condition is that while the student may well have serious difficulties with respect to personality devclop- ment, these are not manifest in blatant school problems. Thus the concept typically used in educational research that there is a "high risk" student has only limited applicability and preventative efforts are extremely difficult. Immunization strategies that focus on the value of staying in school regardless of other stresses would have little value, since the problems are ones that typically result in a student being forced out of school, through expulsion and other disciplinary actions.

An implication of this proposed pathway is that it strongly justi- fies the continued need for alternative programs at the junior-high and high school level. These, as Wehlage and Smith (1986) argue, are the traditional strategies of school districts, providing a special program selectively focused for some target group. From the perspective presented here, there is very good reason to have such programs because the student does indeed have special needs. For instance, a child who develops clinical depression as an adolescent might be able to cope in a program that is sensitive to his or her special difficulties at the time they become manifest. This is quite different from the student who manifests a reading problem that has been known about since the first grade. In that case, implernenta- tion of remedial reading programs in the tenth grade hardly seems an appropriate strategy. The next pathway to be described comple- ments the first two pathways by emphasizing the importance of effective instruction in the early school years.

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72 . SPECIAL SERVICES IN THE SCHOOLS

EARLY SKILL DEFICITS

In the.first two pathways, dropout was essentially conceptualized as a side effect of other processes. In this third pathway, however, it is suggested that direct antecedents to dropping out can be identified as the child fails to maintain contact with the mainstream expectancies within the school. The child enters school with no identifiable characteristics suggesting he or she is "at risk." However there may be social and cognitive skill deficits that make the process of becoming closely connected to school life more difficult. The concept implies that the child will not be easily identified as having future school problems, since there is usually no escalating conflict with school standards.

Cognitive Deficits

In the cognitive realm, the type of skill deficit the student will present might not be an overt learning difficulty, but more subtle limitations in reading motivation or in the metacognitive strategies that aid classroom performance. Children, naturally, come to school with different prior skills in reading, arithmetic, and so on (Staats, 1975). Those who are competent in such areas are likely to receive teacher praise and thus feel good about school and have positive perceptions of their own abilities (Harter, 1982; Weiner, 1985). The less-skilled student may not fail in the early grades, but discrepancies compared to peers become more apparent and diver- gent as the years pass. Obviously, schools have long been sensitive to this pathway and a great deal of instructional and curricular research is geared to solving the situation in which the pupil falls steadily behind academically (e.g., Hawkins, Doueck, & Lishner, 1988).

There is a second type of cognitive skill deficit which is not so clearly recognized and that may interfere with school success. This is the style of information acquisition or attitude towards learning that the child brings to school. There is considerable evidence that the typical middle-class child learns how to comprehend, interpret, and execute the mediation supplied by typical middle-class teachers (Laosa, 1982). Children from different cultural and socio-economic backgrounds, however, though no less intelligent, may have defi-

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Ian M. Evans and Adria DiBenede~lo 73

cits in these academic comprehension skills (Heath, 1983; McDer- mott, 1974). This mismatch between parental and school teaching styles suggests a fruitful area for primary prevention. The school psychologist who is referred a pupil with suspected "learning" dis- abilities and who is sensitive to different styles of learning, might serve that child well by helping to identify the cognitive skill deficits whose remediation reduces the discrepancy between classroom expectancies and the child's mode of knowledge acquisition. There is little evidence that labelling the child learning disabled is a preventative strategy for school failure (e.g., Reynolds, Wang, & Walberg, 1987), whereas understanding the cognitive strategies behind differences in test performance could well be of valuc (e.g., Burns, Haywood, & Delclos, 1987).

Social Skills

Only recently has there been comparable interest in social deficits that may produce a similar result in the social-emotional domain. In clinical child psychology, however, much attention has been given to problems of children who are shy and withdrawn. Although such children are not judged to be particularly problematic by their teachers (see Evans & Nelson, 1977), they have few peer contacts and experience school as a frightening place. Children in this category are sometimes referred to as "neglected" because they are not ac- tively rejected by other children. Rather, these students are ignored and have few if any friends (Asher & Renshaw, 1981).

These social behavioral characteristics are precursors to a great many subsequent adjustment problems. As academic learning gen- erally takes place in a social context, poor peer relationships are thought to undermine academic progress as well. Children with social skill deficits are equally likely to be ignored by teachers. The problem of alienation among school children is often expressed as a consequence of schools having become too large and impersonal. However, the concept of the withdrawn child indicates that such factors are largely irrelevant for those most vulnerable. Other strategies will need to be developed to help children acquire interpersonal skills enabling them to become part of the social fabric, regardless

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74 SPECL4L SERVICES IN THE SCHOOLS

of school size, the development of houses, or other ecological mod- ifications.

The justification for developing and evaluating such procedures is very strong. Although there are well-validated techniques for social skill development (see Gresham, 1988), school dropout is not typically one of the outcome measures (Hughes & Sullivan, 1988). Yet when the psychological literature on poor peer adjustment is reviewed, there is clear evidence that of all the negative outcomes reported, dropping out of school has the strongest predictive relationship (Parker & Asher, 1987). As Parker and Asher (1987) point out, "what makes dropping out particularly interesting when compared with other indices of later academic maladjustment is that dropping out, to the extent that it is undertaken voluntarily and represents a flight from something unpleasant, is an unambiguous re- buke of the school's academic and social setting. In contrast, low grades, grade retention, or achievement test scores are evaluations imposed on an individual by a social system" (p. 363).

ENTRY PROBLEMS

Typically, a certain percentage of children arrive at school for the very first time with significant emotional or behavioral characteristics that interfere with school success. A variety of behavioral ex- cesses interfere with teaching (especially as it is usually carried out) as well as with learning. The child may indeed have deficits in more adaptive, alternative skills, but these are manifest as salient, inappropriate behaviors that foster rejection by peers and teachers. The global interaction between behavior problems and the ultimate dropping out of school is well documented (e.g., Elliott & Voss, 1974; Loeber, 1982). In order to assist in prevention, however, its properties need to be specified in more detail. The fourth pathway, therefore, is that of constant negative interaction between the child and the school system, such that personal and academic problems escalate in an exponential fashion. It is this ever increasing conflict that separates this proposed pathway from the previous one.

To some extent, the pupils fitting into this category are the children whose behavior provokes a negative response from the school.

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Ian M. Evans and Adria DiBenede~ro 75

If the children described in the earlier group are judged withdrawn, then the students in the present group would most likely be labelled delinquent, antisocial, or conduct disordered, if their behavior esca- lates to the point that it comes to the attention of the mental health system. But initially, the negative interactions might be small enough that except for unrecorded teacher perceptions, the official records chronicle only academic markers. This may explain why the better predictive studies tend not to identify patterns of problern- atic behaviors. Lloyd (1978)' for instance, found that the best third grade predictors of dropout were reading and arithmetic achievement, general ability, and history of retention. Thus it is important to understand the interaction between behavior problems and academic success during the very early school years.

Specific Examples

Two scenarios based on actual case examples from a primary prevention project will briefly illustrate the escalation. Leroy entered the first grade somewhat overactive.and noncompliant. He had "street smart" skills from unsupervised roaming his inner-city neighborhood with his older brother's friends. The teacher felt rather intimidated by Leroy's sassy style and was determined to get the upper hand in the classroom.-Other teachers told her that his whole family have been "trouble makers" for the district. She in- sisted on Leroy sitting still and quiet in class and punished his viola- tions of these rules with extra work-sheet assignments. Leroy, who was above average in IQ score, retaliated by seeking peer reinforce- ment, bothering other children and trying to get their attention during work time. By the end of the year the teacher reported his progress in reading and math had been far less than the other pupils in the class.

Nathan, the only child of middle-class parents both of whom were physicians, entered kindergarten with a temperament that did not cope well with change or failure. He was easily frustrated and had temper tantrums when things did not go his way. The teacher responded by sending curt notes home; the parents reacted by offi- cially complaining to the principal about the teacher's hostility. Al-

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though Nathan's academic work was above average, behavior problems in the classroom increased over the year. Describing Nathan as "too emotionally immature for first grade," the teacher recom- mended retention for another year of kindergarten.

If these two children were eventually to drop out of school and became part of a study, the predictor variables might be identified as poor grades and history of retention, respectively. Only by knowing the developmental interactions between adjustment problems and the school's response to them could the real predictive factors be identified.

Prevention

How could later school difficulties in such children be prevented? The most general perspective is a model assuming that the school experience is essentially therapeutic, in the sense that it provides opportunities to learn adaptive behavior. It is an environment potentially characterized by a great deal of stability and sets clear standards and expectations for behavior. However, there is a natural reluctance on the part of teachers to play the role of therapist; teachers are sometimes intolerant of deviance in the classroom and see inappropriate behavior as a sign that the child does not belong. Nu- merous commentators from special education have observed that some categories of handicapping condition (especially learning disabled and emotionally disturbed) are over used and seem to serve the function of removing students with difficult behavior from the educational mainstream. If this is the case, an obvious implication is that early interventions that identify 'students with such problems and try to serve them in different contexts, would be unlikely to achieve their intended purpose. There is, therefore, theoretical support for the concept that with children exhibiting such behavior problems from the outset, teachers and classrooms must provide a combination of effective teaching strategies and management styles that will help keep behavioral disruptions to a minimum (Wang, 1979).

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Ian M. Evans and Adria DiBenedetto

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

The intent of this article has not been to identify all possible approaches to the prevention of dropout, but rather to conceptualize the psychological precursors to dropout so that effcctive strategies can be matched to causes in a rational way. Causes are points on a means-ends continuum of considerable complexity (Dewey, 1922). Poverty would not be a cause of Leroy's dropping out of school any more than Nathan's kindergarten teacher caused his retention by not knowing how to handle temper tantrums. In both cases, a developmental progression can be mapped out in which it might have been possible to arrange things differently and thus alter the inevitability of subsequent school failure. In individual cases, that progression can be described retrospectively with considerable accuracy. This article offers some guidelines for anticipating other students' progressions, thus providing a framework for prevention at the individual level as well as the programmatic. Many approaches try to idcn- tify students who are at risk on the basis of their supposcd characteristics, rather than seeing that the problem is in the interaction between the student and thc school.

The pathways described, therefore, might facilitate identification of individual influences. They point to the reverberating effect of relatively simple experiences-casual teacher remarks that induce pride instead of embarrassment (Seidner, Stipak, & Feshbach, 1988), supportive relationships with someone in the school, or never being labeled a "potential dropout." There are data from dropout research consistent with each category, but without prior conceptual models, descriptive studies are limited. Much of the cur- rent research commits the common error in social science of stating the obvious- that children from disadvantaged backgrounds whose social, emotional, and cognitive development deviate from the norm, are least likely to do well in the conventional system.

Certainly, that statement is not a sufficient explanation of dropout. It fails to identify reasons why students from equally disadvantaged backgrounds do not drop out, and what it is that immunizes some students and makes them less vulnerable. Questions like these must be answered in order to develop effective dropout prevention

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78 SPECLAL SERVICES IN THE SCHOOLS

programs. Special service providers might well be involved in a variety of systems change efforts at a very general level - the effective school movement, home-school partnerships, early cognitive enhancement, and the like. These approaches are compatible with the proposed model, since they have in common the attempt to ensure that the school is good for all children-that it is the antidote for social ills. Within these reforms, however, the pathway concept assumes that some degree of secondary prevention with individual pupils is always going to be necessary. Individual interventions may well be focused on more immediate concerns and not have dropout prevention as an explicit goal. The conceptual model described in this article suggests how any intervention might be de- signed to promote long-term successful completion of school. It allows for a critical prediction, namely that for any intervention- primary or secondary-to be effective with any pattern, it must ter- minate the pathway or change its direction.

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Pathways to School Dropout