ount of the drop-outs
preceding promotion, and if we then estimate that an average of 10 per
cent may drop out before the end of the first semester (the percentage
is 13.2 for our eight schools), then the percentages of failure
recorded for the first year will be reduced by one-eleventh of their
own respective amounts for each school reported by Bliss, as we
translate the percentages to the total enrollment basis. As a
consequence of such a procedure, Bliss' percentages, as reported for
the second year, will be as high as or higher than those for the first
year in six of the ten schools concerned, and nearly equal in two more
of the schools. It is also evident that his percentages of failure as
reported for the junior and senior years are not very different from
each other in six of the ten schools, although there is no inclusion of
the drop-outs in the percentages stated. The only pronounced or actual
decrease in the percentages of failures as Bliss reports them, occurs
between the sophomore and junior years, and it is doubtless a
significant fact that this decided drop appears at the time and place
where the opportunity for elective subjects is first offered in many
schools. Yet apparently it has not seemed worth while to most persons
who report the facts of failure to compute separately from the other
subjects the percentages for the 3- and 4-year required subjects.

A rather small decline is shown in the percentages of failure for the
successive semesters, as quoted below for 2,481 high school pupils of
Paterson[29] (the average of two semesters), although these percentages
are based upon the number of pupils examined at the completion of the
semester. It may further be noted that these percentages do not follow
the same pupils by semesters, but state the facts for successive
classes of pupils. The same criticisms may be offered for the
percentages as quoted from Wood[30] for 435 pupils.

PERCENTAGES OF PUPILS FAILING, BY SEMESTERS

SEMESTERS
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Paterson 17.8 18.4 16.7 15.0 15.6 11.6 9.4 7.4
Wood 24.5 14.5 29.5 30.0 31.0 7.9 16.2 ..
OBrien (p. 41) 11.5 13.9 14.5 15.1 14.5 15.3 12.1 9.9

The above series of percentages tend to agree at least in showing
little or no decline in the percentages of failure for the first five
or six sem