The deficient factual basis of the main explanatory models of dropout in higher education

Journal of Education and Learning (EduLearn) Vol. 17, No. 2, May 2023, pp. 241~248 ISSN: 2089-9823 DOI: 10.11591/edulearn.v17i2.20756  241 The deficient factual basis of the main explanatory models of dropout in higher education Fernando Acevedo Centre for Educational Policy Studies, University of the Republic, Montevideo, Uruguay Article Info ABSTRACT Article history: In the last 40 years in much of the western world dropout rates in higher education have remained almost unchanged. Although student retention seems to be the most studied and discussed aspect, nearly every empirical study on the causes of dropout in higher education and even more the impact of retention actions carried out by universities, in most cases have achieved modest results. This paper argues that this fact finds its explanation, to a certain extent, in the nature of the methodological approaches and factual supports of the empirical studies that most of those actions were based on. In this regard, there are strong arguments and empirical evidence that reveal the deficient nature of the factual basis of the most accepted models, theorizations and measurements on dropout in higher education. Among them are those that underlie the models proposed in 2012 by Vincent Tinto and Adam Seidman, the two main current references on the subject. The most significant questions point to the low reliability of the inferences produced from the application of surveys, especially the national survey of student engagement, very recurrently applied throughout the western world in empirical studies on dropout in higher education. Received Nov 17, 2022 Revised Mar 06, 2023 Accepted Mar 16, 2023 Keywords: Dropout Higher education Methodological approaches National survey of student engagement Surveys This is an open access article under the CC BY-SA license. Corresponding Author: Fernando Acevedo Centre for Educational Policy Studies, University of the Republic Ituzaingó 667, Rivera, Uruguay Email: 1. INTRODUCTION The high magnitude of dropouts in higher education (HE) is ubiquitous. Currently, the dropout rate in HE in the countries that make up the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) is of the order of 40% [1], and a substantial proportion drops out in the first year [2]–[4]. Dropout rates are even higher in Latin America and the Caribbean, at around 50% [5]. Indeed, according to a study carried out at the end of the last decade [6], Argentina and Mexico registered dropout rates in HE of the order of 50%, and Chile and Peru 30%. A more recent study Lastra [7] establishes that in 2009 the dropout rate in the first year in Argentine public universities was 60%. In Uruguay, the dropout rate in HE estimated by the main study in this regard for the period 1997-2004 is practically the same as that corresponding to the average registered in the OECD countries; 36% of students who access HE in Uruguay drop out, half of whom do so between the first and second year [8]. The phenomenon of dropping out of studies in HE began to be a matter of concern in the western world from the last third of the last century, especially in countries where the massification process in HE was already beginning to consolidate in the 1970s [9] and it has been accentuated over the last two decades. In addition, the interest in reducing dropout in HE received a strong boost from the growing relative weight that various national and supra-national organizations attribute to it in their university rankings [10], [11]. Journal homepage: http://edulearn.intelektual.org 242  ISSN: 2089-9823 The dropout rate was taken as a key indicator of the performance of universities [1], [12] and of the quality of education, both at an organizational and institutional level [13], [14] tangible in the case of Europe with the creation of the European higher education area as a result of the Bologna Declaration of 1999. In this sense, there is consensus that a high dropout rate is indicative of low educational quality [10], while it highlights a certain failure in the teaching and learning processes [15] and particularly in the institutional activities of orientation, transition, adaptation and promotion of the student body [16]. The abandonment of studies in HE is a worrying problem due to its personal, institutional and social repercussions [10], [17]. The students can live this situation as an experience of failure or personal frustration [11], which, in addition to conditioning their ways of facing academic, professional and vital challenges [18], could even cause psychological damage [19] and a reduction in their future job opportunities [5]. At the institutional level, high dropout rates produce significant losses of economic income that compromise the financial stability of private educational centers [20] and leave them exposed to the risk of being penalized with government cuts in subsidies or funding. On a social scale, high dropout rates can lead to questioning of the authorities of the educational institutions for the waste of the money invested [4] and for the failure to meet academic and social objectives [10], especially those associated with the need to have a highly trained workforce in an increasingly globalized and competitive market [5], [20]–[23]. The abandonment of studies in HE is, therefore, a matter of growing concern for universities and especially for their authorities, since the survival of both depends on it. On the other hand, in a highly commercialized world like the current one, in which an instrumental vision of HE tends to prevail, knowledge and associated skills are commodities that are endowed with a high potential economic return, which impacts on the meaning and use of the knowledge that is learned in universities [24]. From this perspective, within the framework of the dominant neoliberal ideology in ever-growing portions of the world and the growing drive towards the generalization and internationalization of HE, the abandonment of studies stands, then, as a huge concern of the economic system on a global, regional and local scale. In this regard, the economic implications of dropping out of HE studies have been extensively discussed [14], [21], [25]–[27]. It should be noted that both at the institutional and organizational level, the dropout as a problem reaches serious dimensions due, in addition, to the fact that it is a phenomenon that is difficult to approach with the usual instruments of public policies [28]. Despite the theoretical and conceptual advances in this regard, the very profuse accumulated research and the large amount of money and resources that for decades have been invested in the implementation of programs and services to promote student retention-above all by facilitating their transition to the social and academic systems of universities-in the last forty years have not been able to achieve a significant reduction in the dropout rates in HE [29]–[31]. While it (...truncated)