Dropping out, also known as Early School Leaving (ESL) is a serious issue. It affects many young people across the globe. It is closely connected to unemployment, social exclusion, poverty and poor health. In the 2020/2021 school year, there were 24,385 Dutch early school leavers. The “Early Digital Diagnosis and Intervention (EDDI)” project aims to help improve student retention rates by helping teachers, families and students better understand the causes and consequences of ‘Early School Leaving’. An explanantion, from a Dutch perspective:

Definition Dutch Drop Out

A Dutch school dropout is a young person who:

• is between 12 and 23 years old;
• is not enrolled in a school;
• does not have a basic qualification (a diploma at a minimum of MBO 2, HAVO or VWO level);
• does not come from practical education or secondary special education

Why do Young people leave school too early?

Young people leave school too early for various reasons. Often it is a combination of causes that contribute to the school dropout, such as:

• A wrong choice of study;
• Would rather make money than go to school;
• Personal and mental problems;
• Not the same expectations about the education between school and the pupil or student;
• There is also the issue of the strong correlation between early schoolleaving and juvenile behavior. One possible explanation for this correlation is a lack of social bonding that causes adolescents to both commit crime and drop out of school;
• Poor school performance is the one that matters in the end: Targeting the poorest performers at an early age should therefore be advocated, as this would appear to be the most efficient means to reduce their sequential participation in all forms of risk behavior

Comparison on EU Level

In 2021, 9.7 % of 18-24 year olds in the EU had completed at most a lower secondary education and were not in further education or training (early leavers). On a European level the Dutch are doing pretty good. In 2021, the Member States that reported the lowest shares of early leavers from education and training were Croatia (2%), Slovenia, Greece and Ireland (all 3%) and Lithuania and the Netherlands (5%).

Impacts

Young people who start working without a basic qualification have a greater chance of losing their job than an employee with a diploma. And they more often have flexible jobs, which means that they also have little income as adults.

The Dutch national government wants to prevent young people between the ages of 12 and 23 leaving school without a basic qualification (early school leaving). Without a basic qualification, young people have less chance on the labor market. The government, schools and municipalities are jointly taking measures to help young people go back to school.

The most common measures preventing early school leaving in secondary school and senior secondary vocational education are:

• The national government encourages secondary schools with performance tools to prevent early school leaving. For example, a secondary school receives extra money if it has fewer than a certain number of school leavers. The national government has set standards for this. Secondary schools receive approximately €17 million annually.
• Quality Agendas: MBO institutions themselves take measures to improve the quality of education and appropriate supervision of students. These are in the quality agendas. MBO schools and the national government have agreed that attention will be paid to young people in a vulnerable position and equal opportunities. MBO institutions decide for themselves how they spend the money. An independent committee assesses the plan of each MBO school.
• RMC Function: Installed are regional reporting and coordination function of municipalities. The municipalities have a statutory duty to combat young people dropping out: the Regional Reporting and Coordination Function (RMC function). The people who perform this task are called RMC consultants (advisors). The RMC consultants guide school-leavers back to school. They seek contact by, for example, visiting, calling or sending a letter. And encourage the young people to get the diploma anyway. If this is not feasible, the RMC consultants guide the young people to work or another daily activity. Such as treatment in a care program or volunteer work. The counselors also seek contact with young people who often skip school. Because truancy is sometimes a sign of dropping out of school.

Regional Collabouration Dutch schools and municipalities

The regional plan states which measures schools and municipalities will jointly implement to combat early school leaving.

The most common measures are:

• Extra guidance at schools for young people who need more support. For example, by teachers, social workers or youth workers, who enter into discussions with the young people to give advice;
• Coaches ‘for Switching’ offer help to young people who find it difficult to make a good choice of study.
  Helping young people after school dropout. For example, with research into a new education or work. Or with personal problems;
• Regions provide training to young people in the field of self-knowledge, behavior and social experience;
• Dealing with school absenteeism. If a young person often calls in absent or sick, there may be more going on;
• Schools, municipalities, social workers and youth doctors work together to allow young people to go back to school as much as possible.

Reducing early school leaving to less than 10% across EU Member States by 2020 is one of the EU’s priorities in the field of education. The Commission is working with Member States to implement comprehensive strategies to prevent early school leaving and to engage early school leavers in education and training. The EDDI Project consortium members came together to develop early diagnosis methods for Early School Leaving and to support these methods with digital ICT opportunities. Currently the partners are working on the content development for the EDDI Platform.

Platform Content Development

After the feasibility study carried out in the project partner countries, the factors causing early school leaving were determined and effective strategies were determined. Currently the partners are developing content for the EDDI Platform. Four modules, each with 4 units are currently being developed:

Module 1: Failure in Classes

Module 2: Domestic violence, conflict and inadquate support for students…

Module 3: Inadequacy of social activities

Module 4: Uncontrolled absenteeisme

What’s the Problem?

Early school leaving is linked to unemployment, social exclusion, poverty and poor health. There are many reasons why some young people give up education and training prematurely: personal or family problems, learning difficulties, or a fragile socio-economic situation. The way the education system is set up, school climate and teacher-pupil relations
are also important factors. Since there are often complex, interconnected reasons for the students not completing secondary schooling, policies to reduce early school leaving must address a range of issues and combine education and social policy, youth work and health-related aspects. Some of these challenges are outlined in several studies provided by the Commission.

What has been done so far?

• Setting Up the EDDI Project by project partners: The EDDI project brings together innovative methods, digital interventions and pedagogies that are looking to identify and to address the reasons for early school leaving, and proposes approaches to early ESL diagnosis, prevention and intervention. The project will develop a digital EDDI e-platform, an EDDI Guidebook and an EDDI Android Application.
• EU countries have committed themselves to reducing the average share of early school leavers to less than 10% by 2020. The annual Education and Training Monitor provides data and analysis of early school leaving trends in the EU and in all the Member States.
• EU education ministers adopted a Council Recommendation on policies to reduce early school leaving, which set out a framework for coherent, comprehensive, and evidence-based policies. They agreed to collaborate to exchange best-practices and knowledge on effective ways to address early school leaving
• A working group on early school leaving looked at examples of good practices in Europe and exchanged experiences in reducing early school leaving. The final report outlines 12 key messages for policymakers and translates them into practical tools through a checklist of comprehensive policies and an annex with examples of best practices from several EU countries.
• The Commission organised a conference on policies to reduce early school leaving. One year later, policy developments in eight EU countries were reviewed.
• The Working Group on Schools Policy created a set of policy messages identifying key conditions for implementing a whole school approach to tackling early school leaving, as well as an online European Toolkit for Schools.
• The Council has also adopted Conclusions on reducing early school leaving and promoting success in school.