Keeping youth in school: a follow-up report

Children Today, March-April, 1990 by Sylvia Lee, JoAnne Luppino, Elizabeth Plionis

Imagine yourself a 14-year-old black girl, seventh in a single parent family of 12 sisters.

Imagine growing up on welfare and living in one of Washington, D.C.'s most violent and drug-infested housing projects. Imagine being taken away for three years because of your mother's excessive drinking ... being in elementary school for six years and failing the fourth grade three times ... your own mother telling you that you're dumb and ugly. And imagine that all of your older sisters dropped out of school when they were 13, and four of them became teen mothers.

Annette needs no imagination to round out this scenario. For her, this is real life. If you were Annette, what reasons would you have to stay in school and complete your high school education?

Annette is a part of the tragic scene in which some 600,000 to 700,000 youngsters across the United States will drop out of school this year. In the past decade, concern has focused on the apparent inability of parents and schools to stem the high drop-out rate among high school students, which is estimated at 26 percent nationally but is as high as 40 percent in many cities. The latest study by the District of Columbia Public Education Commission found that the school drop-out rate in Washinton, D.C. in 1989 was over 40 percent and that many youths dropped out while they were still in junior high school. If current trends are not changed, the population dependent upon public assistance will become increasingly larger.

In 1987, Annette joined a new project designed to halt the school dropout trend. CaRed "Keep Youth in School," the 3-year research and demonstration project, which was funded by the Children's Bureau, Administration for Children, Youth and Families, targeted 12- to 15-year-old minority youth in foster care in Washington, D.C. who were at risk of dropping out of school. Conducted under a grant to the Catholic University of America, the project was housed at the National Catholic School of Social Service and cosponsored by Family and Child Services of Washington, D.C., the District of Columbia Department of Human Services, and the Marriott Corporation.

The project used peer mentors-under -graduate students at Catholic University -and employment training and incentives to encourage positive attitudes toward school, improve the youths' school attendance, and enhance their work skills. A detailed description of these strategies, together with an overview of the program's first year of operation, was featured in the July-August 1987 issue of CHILDREN TODAY (see "Keeping Youth in School: A Public Private Collaboration" by Sylvia Lee, Shirley Bryant, Nancy Noonan and Elizasbeth Plionis). This follow-up article presents findings from the project evaluation and discusses what we have learned over the past three years in developing this practice model to address the drop-out problem among high-risk youth in an urban community.

How effective was the project in keeping the youths in school? Of the 97 youths who participated since 1986, only six are known to have dropped out. Annette is not among them. She currently attends special education classes at an ungraded school-and receives plenty of support from the two peer mentors who work with her and her younger siblings.

Of the six who dropped out of school, two joined the Job Corps; two are studying for the G.E.D.; one has obtained a G. E. D. and gone on to college; and one has worked full-time for more than a year since dropping out of school.

As of September 1989, nine project participants have graduated from high school, and three have enrolled in college. The Youths

When they entered the project, the youths were either living in foster family homes or group homes, or they had just recently returned to their own biological parents from foster homes or group homes. They had volunteered to participate, and they could terminate their involvement at any time. Agreement to participate was also obtained from their group home counselors or foster parents.

With the exception of 10 youths during the first year and one during the second, the participants were all betweenthe ages of 12 and 15 when they were accepted into the project. Of the 97 official participants, 10 were superficially involved while 87 were active participants. These 87 youths established and maintained relationships with their peer mentors and participated in project incentive programs.

Among the 97 youths, 94 were black, two were Hispanic and one, Asian. Fifty were female. They came from the inner city, and the majority of them continued to live in the inner city. With a few exceptions, all attended public schools. Their living situations as of September 1989 were as follows: 10 were in independent living; eight had returned to biological parents; five were in restrictive residential settings because of serious emotional or behavioral problems; two were in detention 15 were in group homes; 57 were in foster homes.

Although there have been many changes in the youths' living arrangements over the past three years, the project was able to follow them until further contacts became impossible because of restrictive residential placements geographic location, family disappearance, or refusal of services by their new guardians. By September 1989, 47 youths were still actively participating in the project.