Doctoral Dissertation Research: Poverty, Middle School Dropout, and High School Completion

洛里PeekMeghan Mordy科罗拉多州立大学完成高中学业为贫困青年开辟了新的成功之路。完成学位可以提供更好的工作，医疗福利，更安全的家园和更安全的社区。然而，在美国和其他地方，许多贫穷的年轻人未能获得这一关键学位。本论文的研究探讨了萨尔瓦多萨尔瓦多，只有40%的青年高中毕业生和41%的16-18岁的人在完成中学辍学的情况。近四分之一的人口年龄在10岁至19岁之间，这些年轻人是在青年暴力和儿童贫困的危机中长大的。该项目是一项多年期定性研究，探讨为什么大多数萨尔瓦多贫困青少年被赶出学校，而有些人却能够完成高中学位。它采用民族志实地考察在一个农村和两个城市的学校，包括参与者观察在中学课堂和焦点小组访谈。本论文将研究青年如何脱离学术和确定的因素，使他们在辍学的风险。整个项目旨在说明将贫困儿童的家庭和社区劣势转化为学校劣势的机制。它汇集了分析学校要求学生在学习成绩和课堂行为方面的家庭和社区如何使（或未能使）青年能够满足这些条件，并成功地完成高中学业。更广泛的影响：本文对教育和其他社会政策的影响改革。它与正在进行的学校改革项目密切相关，特别是在萨尔瓦多。研究结果将在会议上和通过会议报告与政策制定者、教育工作者、学校管理人员和其他从业人员分享。更广泛地说，本论文对多边发展援助倡议具有影响。通过提供贫穷青年之间联系的证据？的家庭和社区环境及其教育成果，论文可以用来通知教育和更广泛的社会政策，支持改善全球南部贫困青年的成就和保留的目标。此外，论文将提供可应用于其他研究领域的见解和数据，如中美洲移民模式或该地区青年暴力的研究。

SES-1303548 Lori PeekMeghan MordyColorado State UniversityCompleting high school opens up new pathways to success for poor youth. Degree completion can provide access to better jobs, healthcare benefits, safer homes, and more secure communities. Yet, many poor youth, in the US and elsewhere, fail to earn this critical degree. This dissertation research examines the case of El Salvador, where only 40% of youth graduate high school and 41% of 16-18 year-olds have dropped out before completing middle school. Nearly one-quarter of the population is between the ages of 10 and 19 and these young people are growing up in the midst of a crisis in youth violence and childhood poverty. This project is a multi-year qualitative study that examines why the majority of poor Salvadoran adolescents are pushed out of school, while some are able to complete their high school degrees. It employs ethnographic fieldwork in one rural and two urban schools, including participant observation in middle school classrooms and focus group interviews. The dissertation will examine how youth disengage academically and identify the factors that put them at-risk for dropout. In its entirety, this project aims to describe the mechanisms that translate poor children's family- and community-based disadvantages into school-based ones. It brings together analysis of what schools demand from students in terms of academic performance and classroom behavior with an examination of how families and communities enable (or fail to enable) youth to meet these conditions and successfully complete high school.Broader Impacts:This dissertation has implications for educational and other social policy reform. It is highly relevant to ongoing school reform projects, particularly in El Salvador. Findings will be shared with policy makers, and with educators, school administrators, and other practitioners at meetings and through conference presentations. More broadly, the dissertation has implications for multilateral development aid initiatives. By providing evidence on the connections between poor youth?s home and community environments and their educational outcomes, the dissertation can be used to inform both educational and broader social policy that supports the goals of improving the achievement and retention of poor youth in the Global South. In addition, the dissertation will provide insights and data that can be applied in other research areas, such as studies of Central American migration patterns or youth violence in the region.