The Forum Guide to Early Warning Systems provides information and best practices to help education agencies plan, develop, implement, and use an early warning system in their agency to inform interventions that improve student outcomes. The document includes a review of early warning systems and their use in education agencies and explains the…

The goal of this practice guide is to offer educators specific, evidence-based recommendations that address the challenges of preventing dropout in secondary schools. This guide synthesizes the best publicly available research and shares practices that are supported by evidence. It is intended to be practical and easy for teachers and school…

This version of "Retention. PEPNet Tipsheet," written in Spanish, focuses on understanding the factors that research indicates are important for persistence to graduation and suggests some approaches to reducing attrition among students who are deaf/hard of hearing attending postsecondary institutions. Students who are deaf or hard of hearing and…

This guide is intended to be useful to educators in high schools and middle schools, to superintendents and school boards, and to state policymakers in planning and executing dropout prevention strategies. The target audience includes school administrators as well as district-level administrators, seeking to help develop practice and policy…

Strategies for preventing or responding to truancy and dropping out of school are offered in this resource paper. The document's first few pages draw on statistics from around the United States to illustrate the magnitude of the problem in terms of both its scope and its consequences. The paper then turns to its major focus, strategies to increase…

This manual provides a synthesis of research-based dropout prevention and intervention and offers examples of interventions that show evidence of effectiveness. This has proven to be a difficult task because the intervention research on dropout and school completion that can be used to inform practice is incomplete (Dynarski & Gleason, 2002;…

Students leave school for many reasons. Pregnancy, family circumstances, economic necessities, substance abuse, lack of academic success, or disciplinary actions can influence a young person's decision to quit school. There is no single solution to the dropout crisis. Just as there are a variety of causes behind a student's decision to drop out of…

Representing a school-based intervention strategy, the plan presented within this document was designed to help build a student's self-concept and to provide positive interactions between a student having difficulty succeeding at school and school personnel. While the plan is not intended to be a recipe for success with at risk students, it does…

Identifies basic issues relevant to the development of dropout prevention programs. Considers (1) risk factors leading to dropout, (2) nine possible target groups for dropout intervention, and (3) four possible constraints (cost, burden, directions, and laws) that will influence the consideration and selection of new policies or programs. (IW)

This guidebook is part of a series of program materials for a school-based intervention process to help at-risk students stay in school. An introduction sets forth the responsibilities of the adminstrator/planner. The rest of the booklet contains suggestions for ways to carry out the administrator/planner role creatively and effectively. The…

Faced with alarming dropout rates, educators must find ways to encourage students at risk of dropping out to remain in school. This book describes a variety of prevention programs based on partnerships between universities and local elementary and secondary schools. Among the innovative approaches were combining education and social services in…

This research summary examines the policies and issues that affect the school dropout problem among youth with disabilities. It clarifies the dropout problem, examines government and school policies that affect school holding power, and recommends responses. Information is based on a current dropout prevention research project, findings from five…

The Austin (Texas) Independent School District (AISD) obtained federal grant funds for a school dropout demonstration assistance program, which began operating in 1988-89 as Project GRAD (Grant Research About Dropouts). Project components included the following: (1) piloting the use of dropout intervention specialists at 10 high schools; (2)…

This report summarizes the findings of three 5-year federally financed dropout prevention programs for high risk students and their families known as the ABC programs: ALAS (Achievement for Latinos through Academic Success), the Belief Academy, and Check & Connect. The information is based on a comprehensive report called "Staying in…

Student departure is a long-standing problem to colleges and universities. Approximately 45 percent of students enrolled in two-year colleges depart during their first year, and approximately one out of four students departs from a four-year college or university. The authors advance a serious revision of Tinto's popular interactionalist theory to…