What makes highly able drop-outs happy?

Balanced research and practice

Dutch schools have the responsibility to provide a suitable learning place to every child. In spite of this, there are a lot of drop-outs and a relatively large percentage of these drop-outs are gifted.This (still ongoing) research aims at finding factors that influence the happiness of highly able drop-outs, in order to help teachers in offering fitting education to these children and improving the well-being of the drop-outs. By letting a highly-able interviewer from approximately the same age group talk to 50 highly able drop-outs in their own environment instead of sending out a survey, we hope that the gifted drop-outs will open up more. Additionally, their counsellors will be interviewed. The discussion following the presentation will focus on the finding we have in September and ways to connect the outcomes of the research to practice in such a way that the goal of improving happiness can be reached.