School Dropouts: Who Are They and What Can Be Done?

While Canada has made progress in the past two decades in terms of lowering high-school dropout rates, those rates remain unacceptably high for boys and certain groups limited by poverty or other factors. In this paper, the author warns that the male share of the dropout population continues to rise, with five males now dropping out for every three females. As well, some groups of immigrants, those living in rural areas and Aboriginals also exhibit a worrisome lack of educational achievement compared with the Canadian average. The author recommends strategies to target groups who are falling between the cracks. Among them: education authorities should collect and use reliable data on student performance in core subjects, and should experiment aggressively on initiatives targeted to improve education outcomes for vulnerable groups of Canadians.