ADHD in School Age Children

Thesis Statement: It has been said that children with ADHD have a harder academic life due to increased dropout rates in school, have higher delinquency rates, and have a higher incarceration rate as adults than those who do than not suffer from ADHD.

It has been said that children with ADHD have a harder academic life due to increased dropout rates in school, have higher delinquency rates, and have a higher incarceration rate as adults than those who do not suffer from ADHD. Is this really the truth about those who suffer from ADHD or is this just story meant to scare parents of children with ADHD? At this point I stared doing some research on his condition to see if I could find any real cases and hard data to support them.

Some of the problems that exist at school for children with ADHD are: that they often interrupt others, have great difficulty waiting for his/her turn in school, and often have poor organizational/study skills for their age groups. (Iliades, 2007) Regrettably some children with ADHD find it impossible to stay seated and focused in class, which causes them to throw their hands into the air long before it is ever called or just simply blurting out the answer. It is estimated that between 3 and 5 percent of children have ADHD; so with the average Wisconsin classroom size at 25 students per class, this means that each classroom is likely to have at least one student diagnosed with this condition. According to Doctor William Dodson, Medical Director, ADHD Treatment Center, Denver, Colorado dropout rates of 50% to 63% were reported in a study of 9549 children with ADHD during a single school year. Yet in contrast only 25% of children without ADHD dropped out of school during the same period of time. This means that simply having ADHD doubles your child's chances of dropping out of school. (McCallon 2000) In the world today failing to graduate high school can have a tremendous effect on ones entire adult life and the ability to provide for oneself. The hard truth is that the average income of persons ages 18 through 65 who had not completed high school was roughly $20,100 in 2005, while, the average income of persons ages 18 through 65 who completed their education with a high school diploma, was nearly $29,700. Given the rising costs of living this means a more difficult outlook for those who do not graduate. (American Academy of Pediatrics 2009)

Also the delinquency the rate for children with ADHD is another area where there is a large gap between those whose suffer from ADHD and those who do not. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder is thought to be present at birth and can be a life long affliction. It can affect all aspects of a child's life: his relations with his family, his school work, and his ability to participate in social activities outside of school. In one study done at the University Of ...