Authors: José Manuel Ramírez Aranda, Raúl F Gutiérrez Herrera, Guillermo Jacobo Baca, Rebeca Thelma Villarreal Martínez, Samara Ailet Barahona Heredia, Ana Karen Guajardo Ocañas, Karla Monserrat Ramirez Pintor.
Objective: To compare the health status, education, and employment situation in a group that dropped out of high school with another group that finished it.
Methods: The design is a longitudinal, retrospective, comparative, analytical, community-based study, with house-to-house interviews in four neighborhoods of a municipality north of Nuevo León, Mexico. Two groups of adolescents were included: one that finished three years of high school and another that interrupted it. Absent adolescents not found in three periodic visits or without informed consent were excluded. The main measurements were completed high school or self-reported school dropout, pregnancies, current work and educational conditions, and other reproductive health data. A survey was used on general, academic, and work data and the cause of dropout. Data analysis was descriptive and inferential with a chi-square test and T-test for independent groups; 95% CI and P<.05 for statistical significance.
Results: 116 adolescents were found; 82 who finished high school and 12 who interrupted it were viable. Those who dropped out are currently studying less frequently; they are more likely to have sexual relations (p<.05) and current pregnancies (P=.01). Pregnancy was an important cause of dropping out.
Conclusions: Pregnancy is a reported cause but not the only cause of school dropout; besides, there is more sexual activity without contraception and future pregnancies in those who drop out of secondary school. This situation, their inactive labor status and disadvantageous family conditions configure greater parity and economic and social vulnerability.