Quebec schools develop algorithm to detect students at risk of dropping out
MONTREAL — Eric Racine, head of a school board east of Montreal, says it’s rarely obvious to educators which students will give up on school.
So in a province that has some of the worst high school dropout rates in the country, his board has enlisted a computer algorithm to help pinpoint students at risk.
Along with data specialists at accounting firm Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton, the Val-des-Cerfs school board in Quebec’s Eastern Townships last year developed a computer calculation that has proven remarkably accurate.
Racine says the new measure can find students in Grade 6 who are at significant risk of dropping out of school three years later — with 92 per cent accuracy.