Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2025
Advisor
Jeannette Manger
Abstract
High school graduation is an essential milestone that indicates success later in life. In particular, high school students in California may encounter many obstacles that hinder their opportunity to acquire a high school diploma or equivalent certificate. So, what are these obstacles that students encounter on their journey through high school education? Here we seek to identify whether intrinsic factors, like disconnected youth and educational scores, or extrinsic factors, like segregation, funding, and food insecurity, have a larger impact on the student to reach high school completion. In our study, we utilized data from County Health Rankings for statistical analysis. We found that California has a decreasing rate of high school completion from 2013 to 2021 with a significantly lower rate in 2021 when compared to other Western states. When comparing intrinsic and extrinsic factors, there was significant factors from both sides including reading scores and segregation index as well as school funding with the most significant correlation to high school completion (r =0.686, p < 0.001). However, other factors like math scores, disconnected youth, single-parent homes, and food insecurity were not significant. These results indicate that both sides play a role in the attainment of a high school diploma or equivalent, but school funding appears to be the largest factor to reaching this milestone. We must utilize these findings when formulating policies directed towards improving the educational success of Californians.
Repository Citation
Mandava, A., & Pedregon, J. (2025). Intrinsic and Extrinsic Factors that Affect High School Graduation in California. Wright State University. Dayton, Ohio.
