Patterns of Youth School Attrition in Thailand’s Kanchanaburi Province

Kim Korinek, University of Utah
Sureeporn Punpuing, Mahidol University

Significant disparities in youth school attainment often persist in the face of educational expansion and economic development in developing societies. Using a discrete-time logit model, we analyze four years of data collected in the Kanchanaburi Demographic Surveillance System (KDSS) to delineate the factors that influence youth school persistence and attrition in western Thailand's Kanchanaburi province. Our results indicate that elements of household composition, in particular maternal absence and the presence of elderly adults in the household, are salient factors influencing youth odds of school attrition. Furthermore, unique socioeconomic features of the youth's origin household, in particular human capital, wealth, indebtedness, and the presence of immigrants in the household, are found to be significant factors shaping youth schooling trajectories. The implications of the observed school drop-out patterns for future stratification in Thai society are discussed.