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

SES-1303548 Lori 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、更安全的家庭和更安全的社区。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。这篇论文研究了萨尔瓦多的情况，那里只有40%的年轻人高中毕业，41%的16-18岁的年轻人在完成中学学业之前就辍学了。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危机中长大的。该项目是一项为期多年的定性研究，旨在调查为什么萨尔瓦多大多数贫穷的青少年被迫辍学，而一些人却能够完成高中学位。它在一所农村学校和两所城市学校进行了人种学田野调查，包括在中学课堂上的参与者观察和焦点小组访谈。这篇论文将考察年轻人如何在学业上脱离学业，并找出使他们面临辍学风险的因素。整体而言，该项目旨在描述将贫困儿童在家庭和社区方面的劣势转化为学校方面的劣势的机制。它结合了学校对学生在学习成绩和课堂行为方面的要求的分析，以及家庭和社区如何使(或未能使)年轻人满足这些条件并成功完成高中学业的审查。广泛的影响：这篇论文对教育和其他社会政策改革具有启示意义。它与正在进行的学校改革项目高度相关，特别是在萨尔瓦多。调查结果将在会议和会议演示中与政策制定者、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，这篇论文对多边发展援助倡议具有影响。通过提供贫困青年S家庭和社区环境与他们的教育结果之间的联系的证据，本论文可以被用来为支持改善全球南方贫困青年的成就和留住的目标的教育和更广泛的社会政策提供信息。此外，论文还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.