Grábate y escucha.

The data source for this research is the Educational Longitudinal Survey (ELS). Three waves of this national survey have been conducted to date by the Research Triangle Institute on behalf of the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES). The ELS project has many goals, including measuring high school students’ achievement, attitudes, aspirations, home edu- cational support and educational experiences while in high school as well as eventual transitions, postsecondary education, employment, and living situations later in life (NCES 2005). The ELS is an appropriate data source for my study because it identifies early graduates and other school exiter types, follows them over time and allows for consideration of many theoretically relevant variables in explaining differences between school exiter types.

The first wave of the survey (known as the “base year” or ELS:2002) was conducted in 2002 during the Spring of 10th grade for the study sample. This base year study utilized a two- stage probability sample that enables the sample to be nationally projectable and representative of all high school sophomores. The first stage of the sampling process focused on developing a nationally representative sample of 750 high school schools. Private schools are part of this sample and were intentionally oversampled to enable comparisons with public schools. The

Core of Data (CCD) and the Private School Survey (PSS), both reflecting 1999-2000 survey pe- riods. The CCD data set reflects all public primary and secondary schools and school districts in the U.S. The PSS data set offers a listing and detailed statistics and characteristics of private schools in the U.S. This combined sample frame resulted in over 27,000 sample school candi- dates, and 1,221 of these schools were contacted by NCES for participation in the study. 752 of these schools actually participated in the study. The appropriate ELS weighting factors (National Center for Education Statistics 2005) are used in my study to address potential nonresponse and nonparticipation bias.

The second stage of the sampling process focused on generating a representative student sample from the 752 schools selected in stage one. Approximately 26 sophomores from within each of the participating schools were selected. NCES obtained a student list from each school and performed quality assurance checks on these lists. NCES then developed a stratified sys- tematic sampling of students using race-based strata. The student sample was expanded as need- ed to include additional Hispanic and Asian (National Center for Educational Statistics 2005). This resulted in 17,591 students being selected for the survey, and 15,362 students actually par- ticipated.

In addition to the surveying of students, NCES also surveyed each student’s parents, teachers and select faculty (e.g., math and reading teachers). Asian students were oversampled to support comparisons with white, black and Hispanic students. This base year survey is im- portant for my study because it marks the first time that high school student data (and infor- mation relating to their families, peers and faculty) were collected at a national level. This is al- so the only time in the longitudinal survey process that all respondents were in high school be-

fore they eventually exited in different manners (i.e., graduated on time, graduated early or dropped out).

The first ELS follow-up survey (FU1) was fielded in the Spring of 2004, when most of the sample members were high school seniors. This follow-up survey was administered to stu- dents who had remained in school, graduated early or dropped out. This sample was drawn from the same students who participated in the base year survey and was freshened to include some students who were seniors at the time of the first follow-up survey but were not in the potential sophomore year sampling pool for the base survey because they lived outside the U.S. at the time or because of issues of grade sequence (e.g., they skipped a grade or had been retained). This first follow-up survey is important for my study because it is the first time that I can classify the base year sophomores into different types of expected high school exiters (two years later) since there are clear indications of being on time to graduate, graduating early (with a diploma or with a GED) or dropping out. The ELS study was done is a manner that led dropouts and early grad- uates to voluntarily self-identify by completing a specific questionnaire that reflects their dropout or early graduate status. Only those students in both the base year survey and the first follow-up survey are in my study sample (i.e., no “freshen” sample students are included since their soph- omore baseline information was not collected in the base year study).

A third wave of data, the second ELS follow-up (FU2) were collected in 2006. This sur- vey was issued four years after the base year sophomore survey (in 2002). This second follow- up allows for tracking the different statuses (e.g., college student, parent, married) and trajecto- ries (e.g., two-year college, four year college, full time employment) of the high school exiters. All sampled students from the base year survey and first follow-up survey are included. This second follow-up survey is important for my study because it provides insights into early post-

high school life course transitions and trajectories for the different types of high school exiters. Because of the two-stage probability sampling process used for all three survey waves, the re- sults of each survey can be generalized to be nationally representative (Henry 1990). The base year survey is representative of all 2002 high school sophomore in the U.S., the first follow-up is representative of all 2004 high school seniors, and the second follow-up is representative of for- mer 2004 seniors two years later.