Illinois public high schools across its many counties have seen numerous students leave their academics behind, but the answer to lower dropout rates may lie in the teaching styles in early education teachers.
By Mallory Hartigan
The United States of America and its people pride themselves on being the best at everything whether it is our status as a world power or athletics. When it comes to education, however, the United States is not sparkling at the top of the list.
While every country has its statistics on education, the United States has an increasingly large number of students that do not complete their secondary education in public high school. In Illinois alone, there are roughly 154,000 students that leave school for various reasons.
Some people may look to race to explain such a high number. However, the number of Caucasian student dropouts ages 16 to 17 make up 15% of total Caucasian dropouts in Illinois, ranging from 16 to 24, while only 12% of African American students dropout, according to statistics from 2011 and Hispanic dropouts make up 10% of total dropouts.
DuPage County, now considered the richest in the state, in 2011 students within its borders 566 students dropped out of their respective high schools, making up 3.14% of Illinois’ 18, 018 total dropouts. In contrast, the poorest counties, Jackson and Alexandria, make up 0.64% and 0.09% of the total.
While Peoria County is neither ranked as rich nor poor, its total number of dropouts makes up 2.10% of the state’s statistic. In order to counter the rising number of dropouts in Peoria County, teachers are starting young to instill a sense of necessity for education.
“One of the first things we do, especially in early childhood setting is to instigate and foster an enjoyment for learning,” said Bradley University Early Childhood Education senior and Whittier Elementary School student teacher, Emily Turk. “We really try to create lessons and do activities with these lessons that are engaging and interesting, so students want to come to school and be apart of the classroom community.”
However, there are still some factors to dropouts in high school at the younger levels. Some children do not have exemplary attendance records, which teaches them at a younger age that school is not necessarily a priority in life, said Turk, who has also novice taught at Sterling Middle School and observed at Roosevelt Charter School.
“Usually students that don’t come to school do not have the necessary structure in their lives,” said Turk. “Parents allow students to stay home from school with little or no consequence from the family.”
In order to lessen absences, schools, like Whittier, have begun to implement ways to deter children from missing school with attendance prizes to reward students for their presence at different events.
“We also try to do school wide activities that would be a positive reinforcement, like dances, dream dollar store for trinkets and individual treasure chests in each classroom, for good behavior and good attendance,” said Turk.
Another issue plaguing the education system is a lack of learning disabilities. Districts have individual policies on how and if teachers can tell parents to have their children tested for disabilities, as it is a potential cost to the schools.
“They may feel like they may not be able to express themselves properly [in a classroom setting],” said Turk.
Students who have potentially undiagnosed learning disabilities may find it harder to stay engaged or focused in school in higher grades because the curriculum is more restrictive and does not allow enough room for creativity, which may lead to higher dropout rates in high schools nationwide said Turk.