Exploring Dropout Process: A Conceptual Model

Understanding why pupils drop out of school is the key to addressing this major educational problem. However, identifying the single cause of drop out is extremely difficult to do because, it is influenced by a collection of proximal and distal factors related to both the individual school child and to the family, school, and community settings in which the child lives. The complexity of the causes of dropout is illustrated by the variety of reasons mentioned in the literature.

The literature shows many factors, events and conditions in a pupils’ life that contributed to dropout. While some are directly related to the school, others not related. In a research seeks to explore the process of dropout and to highlight the connection between the causal factor(s) and the final critical factor(s) that led pupils to drop out of school, I found the demand and supply factors mentioned in the literature very useful.

I regard them as frameworks for conceptualising causes of dropout and processes leading to it. The framework acknowledges that drop out represents the critical aspect of the final stage in a dynamic and cumulative process of inter-related practices and processes within and outside school.

A useful way of illustrating the dropout causes – how they spring from both demand and supply related factors, how they are also interlinked at the same time with contextual conditions and how they produce dropout – is to conceptualise dropout as a product of a ‘production’ function. This function is set in motion by the interactions several factors. I use this idea of production

function and to develop a three tiered conceptual framework for understanding dropout. The framework is useful and, indeed, necessary for understanding the why, how and what of dropout. Figure 3.1 depicts the graphical illustration of the conceptual framework. This is followed by an elaboration of it.

Figure 3.1 is a modified version of Big (1989), which considers the different aspects of the dropout phenomenon in relation to its causes, processes and outcomes.

Figure 3:1 Presage, Process and Product Applied to Dropout (adapted from Big, 1989 model of 3Ps)

Source: Adapted from Big, 1989.

Presage phase

In this model, my overall hypothesis about presage factors – causes of dropout is that, dropout is an outcome that resulted from interactions of supply and demand factors with conditions both within and outside school contexts. Factors affecting supply and demand are largely influenced by the wider political and

W ide r Co nte x t DEM AN D FACTO RS SUPP LY FACTO RS Pupil’s experiences of critical events and processes leading to dropout _Drop ou t Household and Community Context School Context

economic context. For example, the supply of schools is shaped by government education policy. Moreover, developments in the macroeconomic environment are reflected in livelihoods at the local level, which in turn affects the demand for education on the part of communities and households. In the diagram, the vertical arrow pointing at the boxes labelled ‘demand’ and ‘supply’ indicates the interaction of these factors.

Demand factors represent socio-economic conditions in children’s backgrounds, and direct and indirect costs of schooling. Supply factors represent the availability of school facility, distance to school, the quality of education, and availability of education resources including books, materials and even teachers.

The box labelled household and community context represents processes and practices outside school, set by demand factors that influenced schooling. They include the poverty conditions of pupils’ households, the structure and arrangement in households, community’s values and beliefs of about children’s schooling, work and economic well-being. The box labelled school context represents the processes and practices within school that are set by supply factors which concurrently influenced schooling. They include teachers attitude to work, the approach to teaching, conditions for repeating pupils and forms of discipline.

The vertical arrow line pointing at the boxes illustrating contexts – household and community, and school indicate the interaction between contexts and demand and supply factors. Thus, the cause of dropout is not simply a fixed attribute that is limited to supply or demand factors alone; rather, it is a function of each, as well as further interactions with certain conditions both within and outside school.

Process phase

Interactions of presage factors – demand and supply with conditions both within and outside school, produce a process which pupils enter. The horizontal arrows originating in the boxes in the presage phase factors show the effects of

interactions of factors that lead to dropout. For example, a pupil may stop attending school entirely as a result of the influences from demand and supply as well as conditions in both contexts.

In the model, this phase may be regarded as the ‘process’ phase. The process phase is illustrated by the broken arrow box in the middle pointing at dropout box. Pupils may enter the process phase when certain critical factor(s) conspire against retention. For example factors that act as stimulus to stop schooling may take the form of a push and or pull.

The ‘push’, may be indicated by the varieties of demand and supply factors and processes and practices both within and outside the school. Push factors may include, direct and indirect costs, teacher related issues, poor performing pupils, and teaching methods among others.

The ‘pull’ may also be indicated by demand and supply factors and processes and practices that attract pupils to stop schooling. Attractions to stop schooling may be the high wages from child labour, a buoyant labour market to hire children, pupils’ perceived success of other children not in school, and expectation of households from children about work and economic well-being.

The process phase marks the beginning of pupils’ departure from school to become school dropouts. As indicated by the arrow illustrating the process phase, pupils who enter this phase easily cross the threshold from being enrolled and become dropout children.

Product phase

The ‘product’ phase in the model shows dropout as the outcome of the interactions of the presage factors. First the interactions between the demand and supply factors and conditions both within and outside school contexts – presage factors creates a process, secondly, as pupils enter this process phase, they are easily pushed or pulled to terminate their schooling.

In summary, the three phases of the presage-process-product model when combined provides a conceptual framework for exploring dropout. It highlights the complex interactions between the factors and conditions that produce a particular process along which children cross the threshold from being enrolled pupils to out of school children – dropouts. The process phase of the model is very important in this study because, it indicates the particular aspect of dropout that this study sought to explore. To understand the worldviews about the dropout process, an exploration of the experiences of children who dropped out of school would be useful.

The argument here is if we are to prevent pupils from dropping out of school and encourage those children who have already dropped out to return to school, a clearer understanding of dropout processes in context in particular is required. In a study of girls and basic education in northern Ghana, it is argued that children who are at risk of dropping out and those who have dropped out must be identified (Stephens 2007).

Any study that aims to unravel the dropout process must therefore highlight its stages and the point at which a child may be regarded as being ‘at risk’ of dropout. This model was therefore a useful framework for conceptualising dropout in a study that sought to explore contextually this phenomenon and the process leading to it. Moreover, the framework provided direction for the development of themes that guided the formulation of interview questions in the data-gathering process.

3.5 Conclusion

This chapter considered the international policies in which the agenda on EFA and the need to curb dropout are anchored. Next, I reviewed definitions of dropout from the literature; and subsequently introduced the concept of demand and supply conditions to explain why dropout occurs. The chapter concluded with a conceptual framework built on an explanation of the causes of dropout based on the literature.

The next chapter discusses the methodology and methods I used in exploring the dropout experiences of children in Ghana. The chapter highlights the epistemological and ontological considerations that underpin the study, and lists the justifications for my choice of methods.

CHAPTER 4

Methodology and Methods 4.1 Introduction

This chapter discusses the research methodology of the study. It evaluates the ontological and epistemological underpinnings of qualitative and quantitative research, and asserts the rationale behind the adoption of a qualitative approach. This is followed by a section highlighting the research design; the methods and procedures used during data collection; and the manner in which findings are analysed and reported. The chapter finally considers issues relating to positionality and ends with a conclusion.

4.2 Methodological Considerations in Researching Dropout: Ontology and