Dispersione scolastica, tema sfidante per le politiche educative. Livelli di attenzione e strategie in quattro casi nazionali

In this issue (International Obstervatory on Education) 4 national case-studies are collected in order to analyze the school leaving, in both the available definitions: as ESL – Early school leaver and NEET – Not in education, employment or training. The four countries have different performances in the dropout rates: Italy (17%) and Portugal (18,9%) are positioned since long time in the last tie of the European rank, even if different degrees of success in the school abandonment reduction (i.e. Portugal looks best performing than Italy as for the last decade). UK (12,3%) is over the Eu average but with variable results as the dropout reduction. France (9,7%) is below the Eu mean (11.9%) and acquired important results from its policies against school abandonment. The issue shows the different ways by which the problem has been approached, that depend not only from the negative impacts of the current financial crisis but also from the different choices on how to nest the fight against early school leaving within each national strategy for education, youth occupation and, more broadly, social care.