Findings from a study of administrators' perceptions of student dropout causes and possible interventions are presented in this paper. Current dropout literature was categorized into four sources of student withdrawal from school--schools, parents, peers, and students. A national survey of 650 secondary principals and 650 superintendents produced 891 responses, a 68.5 percent response rate. Results show that "criminal/victimization" causes, which include substance and child abuse, crime involvement, and illiteracy, received the highest composite level of agreement. Respondents assigned most importance to those causes that reside within students, those least controllable by administrators. The national priority set forth appeared to be one of blaming the victims. That administrators ranked school-related factors over which they had the greatest control as less important raises the question that they may be distancing themselves from the problem. Two tables are included. (30 references) (LMI)