Latin America still lagging in quality secondary education

Collecting accurate data about students and programs, fostering parent and family engagement, improving the quality of teachers and incorporating a gender-based perspective in public educational policies are some of the recommendations listed in the report titled “Policies to improve permanence and completion of secondary education in Latin America and the Caribbean,” drafted by CAF-development bank of Latin America- and Results for Development (R4D), to reduce school dropout rates and achieve a universal, quality secondary education in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The publication, based on the analysis of four school initiatives in Mexico and Chile, points out that currently only 59% of Latin American students complete secondary education – women ranking higher than men in percent of high school graduates–, way below the expected levels, considering that secondary education is mandatory in most countries in the region.

Although secondary school dropout varies significantly per country, the report suggests that it conditions economic growth and contributes to the expansion of informal economy, which currently employs virtually half of the Latin American workforce. In addition, people who drop out early tend to remain unemployed for longer periods and have fewer tools to address the challenges arising during and after their education.

“Over the last 20 years, Latin America has made significant progress in terms of access to secondary education, both among men and women. However, high secondary school dropout rates hinder socioeconomic development of the region, and call for coordinated solutions to ensure that more students can complete their studies and contribute with their future jobs to increase productivity and competitiveness of Latin America,” explained Julián Suárez, CAF’s Vice President of Sustainable Development.

To curb secondary school dropout rates, the report proposes nine recommendations, which should be implemented taking into account the gender perspective, based on the quality of learning environments, inclusive and participative approaches, data, targeting, coordination and investment in school capacity.

1. Improving the school environment to promote a sense of belonging. The potential strategies to improve the school environment include the development of school improvement plans, training teachers in awareness (including gender awareness), ensuring that at-risk students receive individualized attention and grouping together students who face similar challenges, as well as providing these students with targeted support.
   
   
2. Increasing relevance of curricula and quality of pedagogy to improve the relationship with the labor market and continuing post-secondary education. Among the measures to improve the quality of learning, the report highlights the incorporation of training in socioemotional skills, which begins to address a worrisome mismatch between what students learn at school and the socioemotional skills sought by employers. Other measures include, for instance, greater support for students to plan the transition from school to the labor market. 
   
   
3. Incorporating a gender-based perspective into the design of school dropout reduction initiatives. Secondary education initiatives should consider how and where gender can influence the participation of different stakeholders and program effects. Impact assessments can build evidence on why different groups drop out, in order to identify ways to respond and adapt the gender-sensitive assessment frameworks. 
   
   
4. Enhancing parent and family engagement. In order to encourage participation of parents and families, general and more preventive activities and responses targeting specific goals (text messages or home visits) can be implemented for families with lower levels of engagement. Initiatives to ensure parent engagement may be implemented at school, at home and in the broader community. 
   
   
5. National and local early warning systems. These should include identification and response components to ensure that the right students receive the necessary support to remain in school. Identification should use available secondary data (attendance, behavior and course-based performance), while responses should include outreach to students and families, customized approaches and long-term follow-up. 
   
   
6. Strengthening data on implementation. School dropout reduction programs need accurate data on how activities are implemented, their effects and costs in order to improve initiatives and scale programs effectively. Therefore, appropriate monitoring, evaluation and learning strategies should be integrated into program models at the design phase. 
   
   
7. Strengthening the coordination between national and regional initiatives. Formal communication and coordination among initiatives that directly and indirectly work to reduce school dropout rates should be improved. Once aligned at the national level, initiatives should work closely with and support state or regional education system officials to streamline local implementation.
   
   
8. Providing resources to support decision-making at school. Schools are often the target of dozens of interventions seeking to effect changes, which can lead to duplication of efforts, inefficient use of resources and overburdening of school stakeholders to coordinate activities. These challenges can also be mitigated by ensuring that schools understand and organize a plan according to their needs and potential solutions, have the autonomy to decide how to best respond and receive continuous resources and support.
   
   
9. Investing in human capital. School stakeholders are closest to students and can identify, support and monitor those at risk of dropping out in ways that are contextually relevant. An additional investment in existing or new human capital is needed to generate a long-term impact and to effectively leverage the training, tools and other program inputs. 

Lessons from Mexico and Chile

Noteworthy lessons learned from case studies in Mexico –through cases of Construye T and Yo No Abandono– include an evolution in attitudes towards school dropout, and there has been a perception shift, from being considered a risk behavior to being seen as a symptom of the need for broader changes within the educational system.

Rather than focusing only on at-risk students or vulnerable youth, Construye T and Yo No Abandono take broader and more positive approaches. Likewise, scholarships and other financial support for low-income students remain an important complement to school-wide solutions to address the issue of retention, considering that poverty and economic constraints still represent a significant obstacle for students to complete the upper secondary school cycle.

In the case of Chile, JUNAEB’s data and targeting system and the program Aquí Presente were analyzed.  Both initiatives combine different strategies to identify at-risk students and provide a solution. On the one hand, an early warning system at the national level, such as the JUNAEB, can identify in advance and at different levels the groups of students who are at risk of dropping out, and assign resources and interventions to mitigate their risk. On the other hand, an initiative focusing on the educational centers, such as Aquí Presente, with full-time staff devoted to the program, can quickly respond to students’ needs, understand the source of the risk and design a customized response.