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Page 24
This increase of percentages by semesters for the graduates on the
total possibility of failure, as just noted, is due to an actual
increase in the number of failures for the later semesters. By the
distribution of failures in Table II more than 56 per cent of the
failures are found after the completion of the second year, in spite of
the fact that about 10 per cent of the pupils who graduate do so in
three or three and a half years. The failures of the graduates are
simply the more numerous after the first two years in school. That this
situation is no accident due to the superior weight of any single
school in the composite group, is readily disclosed by turning to the
units which form the composite. For these schools the percentages of
the graduates' failures that are found after the second year range from
40 per cent to 66 per cent. In only three of the schools are such
percentages under 50 per cent, while in three others they are above 60
per cent.
Further confirmation of how the increase of failures accompanies the
pupils who stay longer in school is offered in the facts of Table IV.
Here are indicated the number of pupils who before graduating fail 1,
2, 3, etc., times, in semesters 1, 2, 3, etc., up to 10. Of all the
occurrences of only one failure per pupil in a semester, 50 per cent
are distributed after the fourth semester. In this same period (after
the fourth semester) are found 53.2 per cent of those with two failures
in a semester; 67.6 per cent of those with three failures in a
semester; 71.6 per cent of those having four; 78.6 per cent of those
having five; and all of those having six failures in a single semester.
One could almost say that the longer they stay the more they fail.
The statements presented herein regarding the relative increase of
failures for at least the first three years in school are likely to
arouse some surprise among that portion of the people in the
profession, with whom the converse of this situation has been quite
generally accepted as true. Such an impression has indeed not seemed
unwarranted according to some reports, but the responsibility for it
must be due in part to the manner of presenting the data, so that at
times it actually serves to misstate or to conceal certain important
features of the situation. Since the dropping out is heaviest in the
early semesters, and since the school undertakes the expense of
providing for all who enter, it does not seem to be a correct
presentation of the facts to compute the percentage of failure on only
the pupils who finish the whole semester. Such a practice tends to
assign an undue percentage of failures to the earlier semesters, one
that is considerably too high in comparison with that of the later
semesters where the dropping out becomes relatively light. It is not
sufficient to report merely what part of our final product is
imperfect, instead of reporting, as do most institutions outside of the
educational field, what part of all that is taken in becomes waste
product. This situation is sufficiently grievous to demand further
comment.
In his study of the New Jersey high schools, Bliss states [28] that one
of the striking facts found is the "steady decrease of failure from the
freshman to the senior year." If we bear in mind that Bliss used only
the promotion sheets for his data, and took no account of the drop-outs
preceding promotion, and if we then estimate that an average of 10 per
cent may drop out before the end of the first semester (the percentage
is 13.2 for our eight schools), then the percentages of failure
recorded for the first year will be reduced by one-eleventh of their
own respective amounts for each school reported by Bliss, as we
translate the percentages to the total enrollment basis. As a
consequence of such a procedure, Bliss' percentages, as reported for
the second year, will be as high as or higher than those for the first
year in six of the ten schools concerned, and nearly equal in two more
of the schools. It is also evident that his percentages of failure as
reported for the junior and senior years are not very different from
each other in six of the ten schools, although there is no inclusion of
the drop-outs in the percentages stated. The only pronounced or actual
decrease in the percentages of failures as Bliss reports them, occurs
between the sophomore and junior years, and it is doubtless a
significant fact that this decided drop appears at the time and place
where the opportunity for elective subjects is first offered in many
schools. Yet apparently it has not seemed worth while to most persons
who report the facts of failure to compute separately from the other
subjects the percentages for the 3- and 4-year required subjects.
A rather small decline is shown in the percentages of failure for the
successive semesters, as quoted below for 2,481 high school pupils of
Paterson[29] (the average of two semesters), although these percentages
are based upon the number of pupils examined at the completion of the
semester. It may further be noted that these percentages do not follow
the same pupils by semesters, but state the facts for successive
classes of pupils. The same criticisms may be offered for the
percentages as quoted from Wood[30] for 435 pupils.
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