Thousands of Troubled Students Drop Out Before High School

Chicago Reporter, The, June, 2001 by Mick Dumke

"If you put too much pressure on kids, they will want to drop out at some point," she said. "You can go too easy on them, but hollering at them is making it worse."

Frederick Lucas agreed. While blaming himself for making poor decisions, he wished more of his teachers could have understood him. "I basically raised myself since I was 13, and I feel I'm a man. You talk to me with respect-don't raise your voice at me," he said. "You've just got to be there and understand kids, talk to them, know what they're going through."

Frederick, who is now 17, attends Sullivan House Alternative High School, 8164 S. South Chicago Ave. He said he hopes to become a respected businessman.

"I want to be someone sitting behind a desk in a suit, getting calls, like 'Mr. Lucas, you got a call on line one.' Walking into the office, hanging up the jacket to my suit," he said. "I had to wake myself up. ... I did my wrongdoing, but I want to be the one to just turn everything legit."

Contributing: Elizabeth Duffrin, an associate editor for CATALYST: Voices of Chicago School Reform, and Elizabeth Raap. Joyce C. Armour, Anita Bryant and Danielle Duncan helped research this article.

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Most Grade School Dropouts Are Black
During the 1999-2000 school year, African Americans accounted for
52 percent of all sixth, seventh- and eighth-graders in the Chicago
Public Schools, and 65 percent of dropouts that age. Latinos
represented 34 percent of the student body and 26 percent of
dropouts.
1999-2000 population
Asian, Native American  3.4%
White                   11%
Black                   52%
Latino                  33.6%
Note: Table made from pie chart
1999-2000 dropouts
Asian, Native American   1.4%
Black                     65%
Latino                  26.2%
White                    7.5%
Note: "Dropouts" include all sixth, seventh- and eighth-grade
students who were enrolled in Chinago's public schools in
September of one school year but no longer enrolled the
following September, and who had not transferred to another
school district.
Source: Consortium on Chicago School Research, Chicago Public
Schools; analyzed by The Chicago Reporter.
Note: Table made from pie chart

'I Was Not Thinking of School'

Some students make it through elementary school, only to drop out on their way to high school.

Yesenia Sotelo is one of them. Her bangs hung in her eyes as she lugged a heavy backpack from class to class one recent spring day at Latino Youth Alternative High School, 2200 S. Marshall Blvd. in the Little Village neighborhood. The 18-year-old freshman said she was back in school for the first time since 1996, when she graduated from Maria Saucedo Scholastic Academy, 2850 W. 24th Blvd.

Sotelo found out the summer after graduation that she was pregnant. "I didn't have anyone," she said. "Nobody talked to me. I never told my mother."

Late one night, she climbed out of a window in her Little Village home and moved to her boyfriend's apartment. Her mother was angry, Sotelo recalled. Her father, who had been away working in Mexico, refused to speak to Yesenia for a month after he returned.