Hispanic students have higher high school dropout rates than White or Black students.

Young adults who do not finish high school are more likely to be unemployed and earn less when they are employed than those who complete high school.⁴ The percentage of 16- to 24-year-olds who are out of school and who have not earned a high school credential, such as a General Educational Development (GED) credential, is called the status dropout rate. In 2000, the status dropout rate for Hispanics was 28 percent, higher than the 7 percent rate for Whites and the 13 percent rate for Blacks. The status dropout rate for Hispanics declined by 7 percentage points between 1972 and 2000; for Whites the rate declined by 5 percentage points and for Blacks by 8 percentage points.

The average status dropout rate for Hispanics is partly attributable to the markedly higher dropout rates among Hispanic immigrants; more than one-half of Hispanic immigrants never enrolled in a U.S. school, but are included as high school dropouts if they did not complete high school in their country of origin.⁵ The 2000 status dropout rate for Hispanics born outside the United States (44 percent) is higher than the rate for first-generation Hispanic youth (15 percent).⁶ However, among youth born in the United States, both first- and second-generation Hispanics are still more likely to drop out than their counterparts of other races/ethnicities (supplemental table 3.3).⁷

4  P. Kaufman, M.N. Alt, and C.D. Chapman, Dropout Rates in the United States: 2000 (NCES 2002-114).
5  Ibid.
6  Individuals defined as "first generation" were born in the United States with at least one parent born outside the United States.
7  Individuals defined as "second generation" were born in the United States, as were both their parents.