Causes Of High School Dropout Essay

It is often said that education is the key to success and this is simply because of the advantages that it brings to one’s life, i.e. it expands one’s mind with knowledge of which no one can take away from you. But what if too many students do not complete their high school? This problem of high school dropouts is prevalent in the community of Stretford (a township in the Johannesburg south). By definition, dropout means “a person who stops going to a school, college, etc., before finishing: a person who drops out of a school” or a clear concise definition, according to Jakuja, “Dropout: Dropout most commonly refers to a learner leaving school before the official exit grade level” (Jakuja, 2009: 25). With reference to the above mentioned problem

One of the causes of such high unemployment rate is said to be lack of education as this is the primary key to unemployment, thus learners who drop out of school lack education and are unlikely to be employed. High school dropout has a negative impact on the country’s future and also affects the community to a very a large extent as far as community development goes. There is a shortage of skilled workers in our country and an increase in high school dropout affects the labour market as there would less employable individual. A learner’s decision to quit school is affected by different factors. To prevent this problem local community leaders are trying to search for various issues that may lead to high school dropout. One of the major factors of high school dropout is the territory which one surrounds him/herself with this being the peers you are associated with. Unfortunately these actions bare their own costs this include the likelihood of that learner being a lower earning individual or worse unemployment maybe another case. Various aspects will be discussed from the impact that teachers, families and the community have in order to alleviate high school dropout, to the government’s involvement in high school