parental irresponsibility is the cause of the high rate of school dropout

Section 1 (Defense): Parental Involvement is the Most Paramount Factor to Academic Success My opponent has falsely implied that a death in the family implies that one parent (or both) are deemed irresponsible, which is a complete fabrication of this section, and not even mentioned in my argument frankly. My argument addressed how a lack of responsible parental involvement attributes to the factors that my opponent claims outweighs parental irresponsibility itself. But to refute, death isn’t even the major cause of such single-parent families anymore. By 1996 in the United States, the single-parent home was expected to include a never-married individual as a divorced parent. Unmarried women in the United States are responsible for approximately 1/3 births in 1995, compared with 1/5 in 1980 and 1/10 in 1970[1]. Therefore, we have single parents (mostly women) that never married, and have their children out of wedlock, which leads to such single-parent households with an absent father not due to death, but irresponsibility in their own sexual conduct. I then challenge my opponent’s claim he makes in his first section: “ most students drop out of school because of poverty” Where is the statistic that shows poverty makes students drop out? Poverty itself isn’t a reason that makes students drop out, that’s just a broad brushstroke for a possibility of other certain factors, and what seems to be an unreferenced one at that Section 2 (Defense): Many Other Contributing Factors have a Direct Link to Parental Involvement in Regards to Academic Success The dropout rate for African-Americans reached a momentous trough of 8% in 2013, whereas rates amid Hispanic students also attained a significant low of 12% in 2013. In spite of this, the enduring decline is at least in some measure related to enlarged incarceration rates among young black and Hispanic males, which disproportionally affects dropout rates, as it has more than doubled between 1980 and 1999, eliminating them from the statistical count[2] This indicates that the “dropout” rate is still plagued by students, predominantly Hispanic and African-American, due to higher incarceration rates of such potential graduates. But again, as I said in the last round, such a factor can be greatly reduced due to a better family structure in the home of the student. Gottfredson and Hirschi (1990) assert that bad parenting has one criminogenic significance, which is low self-control in children. They also affirm that low self-control is not a learned trait, but rather children unconsciously progress such low self-control because poor parenting produces an unruly home life. A dysfunctional home life fails to indoctrinate in children the required internal social controls that will help them avoid them from participating in criminal (or similar) behaviors impulsively. This study affirms that ineffective parenting is the primary source of low self-control and, therefore, self-control facilitates the consequences between parenting and crime. Therefore, this coincides with my Second Section very nicely, in which we have a superficial factor (incarceration due to crime) that is pertained to students not completing high school, and it is sufficiently linked to poor parenting examples in the child’s home. So when my opponent continues to assert that bad parenting and a dysfunctional family structure is not the ultimate cause of such high dropout rates, or takes a back-seat to other factors, he fails to recognize where such superficial factors are generated from. Moving along, my opponent has clearly missed my example with teenage pregnancy, as my opponent actually brought it up as one of his factors that, (in his view), outweigh parental irresponsibility as the cause of high school drop-out rates. I clearly stated that women with absent fathers have a significantly higher chance or teenage pregnancy than those that have fathers that are actively present in their lives. Now in the second round, my opponent clearly stated teenage pregnancy as one of his contentions for dropout rates, so would my opponent be backtracking his previous statement? Section 3: Rebuttals to my Opponent’s Previous Claims An 8000 character limits me from debating my opponent’s individual claims contently, but since he boasts that they are uncontested, I must address them as concisely but adequately as possible Teenage Pregnancy: Already discussed The Urge of Pursuing Their Talents/ 'Get Rich Quick' Attitude/ Lateness Absenteeism: What are these referring to? Who’s urging who? Teachers? Parents? This is a broad generalization of a claim that seems to be false, and used to stuff the numbers of the “9:1” ratio against ineffective parenting Lack of Proper Teacher-Parent-Interaction: If a teacher is not communicative, then yes I agree that it can be a problem. However, I would ask the opponent how many teachers does a child go through in his/her years? One teacher? For the 12+ years it takes from the beginning of education to the end of high school? My opponent apparently knows something we do not or this is again another tactic of a broad brushstroke claim that is unfounded in terms of high school dropout rates. Psychological Disorders or Other Physical Diseases If a child has psychological conditions from birth, or is held back due to a medical condition, then yes I am sure that a child could be left behind in some cases. No one doubts that such exceptions should be made in terms of medical conditions. However I contest that this would top parental irresponsibility, or else perhaps my opponent’s argument would then be that a sizeable percentage do not finish high school because of medical concerns? This by no means outweighs the percentage of my argument of the family environment of the student. The Will of the Child: I challenge what my opponent refers to here? Again, this is another cause of my opponent making a broad brushstroke of an unfounded claim to stuff his “ratio” for such flawed support for his argument. What does my opponent exactly define by the “will of the child”? The Influence of the Media/ Bad societal values/ Peer Influence: My opponent still fails to see my argument of Section 2, which is that many factors are in fact caused, promoted, or limited by the family environment of the student. I agree that media has an influence in all of us, but there are ways that parents can block negative influence or promote positive external influences in their kids through media. For example, if a kid is watching most media through a TV, there is research and methods that indicate how parents can reduce the influence of media on their children[4]. Simple measures such as reduction of television viewing, discussing about violence or other negative behavior with children, keeping violence out of the home (which is even more of an influence that a plain media influence) and consistency in discipline. So yes, my opponent’s “9:1 ratio” is simply illogical to defend. I will then refute his claim that students will act like “angels” at the home, but then for some reason will turn into some “demons” in the classroom. I challenge as to what he is referencing here. A study? A statistic? His own personal account, which would most likely not be representative of a sample population? ----- References: [1]: . http://family.jrank.org... [2]: . http://www.childtrends.org... [3]: Unnever, James D. , Francis T. Cullen, and Robert Agnew. WHY IS “BAD” PARENTING CRIMINOGENIC? A TEST OF RIVAL THEORIES* [4]: . http://www.apa.org... ----- Thank you again to chezbona for his participation, his rationale, his effort.