Goal Structures in the Learning Environment and Students’ Disaffection From Learning and Schooling

Students who are disengaged from learning and schooling are a primary concern of researchers, educators, parents, and the nation at large. Unfortunately, some students do not like school, do not feel like a valued member of the school community, are skeptical about the value of schooling for their future lives, feel a disjunction between their lives at home and at school, and engage in disruptive behavior. In and of itself, this is disheartening. But the long-term implications of these indicators of disaffection are profound. These signs of disaffection are often the early signs of impending school failure, school dropout, and risky behaviors (Comer, 1987; Finn, 1989; Ianni, 1989; Steinberg, Blinde, and Chan, 1984). Research on school failure and dropout indicates that they are not discrete events in students’ lives. Rather they are processes, often with a host of experiences and indicators foreshadowing them, and often with long-term consequences that extend beyond the event itself (Kerckhoff and Bell, 1997-1998). Negative experiences that lead to dropping out of high school can start much earlier in elementary and middle schools (Krohn, Lizotte, and Perez, 1997). Furthermore, these processes of disengagement need not lead to dropping out or failure per se-students may remain in school long enough to graduate, but they may be “virtual dropouts, " disengaged from the academic and social experiences of school, with long-term negative implications.