Abstract
The purpose of this research was to understand the common reasons that lead to some learners dropping out of high school and to provide insight into what students who have dropped out do after they dropped out of school. My research was targeted at individuals who were 18 years old and older and had dropped out of high school. This study used the conceptual framework asserted by Branson, De Lannoy and Kahn (2019) who argue that people who did not attain their matric qualification in most cases cannot secure stable jobs and generally experience a low quality of life, including poor health, drug problems, high pregnancy rates, high dependency on social grants and sustained mental health problems. The conceptual framework is therefore underpinned by the hypothesis that a number of factors cohere to cause a student to make the decision to drop out of school and that the decision has long term consequences for students. A standard qualitative research study was conducted by collecting data via semi-structured interviews. the data was used to identify some of the reasons that led to learners dropping out of high school in the Johannesburg Central township of Zola North. Individual interviews were conducted with four participants, two males and two females. The findings concur with the existing literature and shows that a number of factors are at play when a student decides to drop out of school. The study showed that the decision to drop out of school was not just an event that took place in the participants’ lives; rather, it was a journey constituted by a number of challenging occurrences. In the end, my participants regretted their decision to drop out of school, as it had led to major setbacks in their lives, including the struggle to find stable quality jobs and the inability to register at institutions of higher learning. Seeing their former classmates leading successful lives remained a reminder of their ill-informed decisions to drop out and the fact that they may never realise the goal of attaining a matric certificate.
M.Ed. (Educational Leadership and Management)