Jennifer Lansford is a professor of public policy at Duke University and started a research team to study resilient high school dropouts. She wanted to learn what factors help students live successful lives after leaving high school early.

But her focus quickly changed.

“We found really too few people in our study that fell into that category of having dropped out of school but were doing well in adulthood to analyze them in a systematic, quantitative way.”

The surprisingly low number of successful dropouts, prompted Lansford to focus on the triggers that contributed to the students’ negative paths. Her research followed 585 children from age five to 27.

“We were looking at risk and protective factors from childhood and adolescence that might be able to alter those negative trajectories for high school dropouts.”

Lansford says that students who don’t graduate from high school or earn a GED are at a higher risk for negative life outcomes.

“Things like being incarcerated, using illicit drugs, relying on government assistance, having poor health – these are all negative life outcomes that are much more likely to happen for dropouts.”

After studying the participants for 22 years, Lansford found that factors causing students to drop out can start early in life.

“Being socially rejected by elementary school peers or becoming a parent at a very early age worsened the trajectory of people who dropped out of school.”

The research uncovered preventative measures, too. Lansford says there’s hope for students suffering from drug addictions and behavioral issues.

“If they’re treated for those behavioral, emotional or drug problems by the age of 24, we found that the life trajectory improved through the age of 27.”

Throughout her years of research, Lansford says she has seen areas where communities can better support growing children. Rather than treating the problems after they take root, Lansford suggests taking preventative measures.

“One idea would be treating these problems holistically, so clustering services that would be designed to help with behavioral, emotional and drug problems, for example, early on to try to prevent dropout in the first place.”

But if a student does drop out, Lansford says she’s encouraged by the positive impacts she’s seen of counseling – meaning it’s never too late to make a change.

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