DROPOUT Definition & Meaning

View synonyms for

dropout

or drop-out

[ drop-out ]

Phonetic (Standard)IPA

noun

an act or instance of dropping out.
a student who withdraws before completing a course of instruction.
a student who withdraws from high school after having reached the legal age to do so.
a person who withdraws from established society, especially to pursue an alternate lifestyle.
a person who withdraws from a competition, job, task, etc.:
the first dropout from the presidential race.
Rugby. a drop kick made by a defending team from within its own 25-yard (23-meter) line as a result of a touchdown or of the ball's having touched or gone outside of a touch-in-goal line or the dead-ball line.
Also called high·light half·tone [hahy, -lahyt , haf, -tohn]. Printing, Photography. a halftone negative or plate in which dots have been eliminated from highlights by continued etching, burning in, opaquing, or the like.
Also called dropout error. the loss of portions of the information on a recorded magnetic tape due to contamination of the magnetic medium or poor contact with the tape heads.

dropout

/ ˈ��ɒ��ˌ��ʊ�� /

noun

a student who fails to complete a school or college course
a person who rejects conventional society
drop-out rugby a drop kick taken by the defending team to restart play, as after a touchdown
drop-out electronics a momentary loss of signal in a magnetic recording medium as a result of an imperfection in its magnetic coating

verb

to abandon or withdraw from (a school, social group, job, etc)

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�y��vlog History and Origins

Origin of dropout¹

1925–30, Americanism; noun use of verb phrase drop out

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Example Sentences

Examples have not been reviewed.

But like generations of pilgrims, dropouts, and merry pranksters before him, what he discovered on that journey was his mission.

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He knew her as a teenage co-ed and a young dropout wife, then a divorcée and a mother to boys.

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In 2003, the show found its first “Schmo” in Matthew Kennedy Gould, a law school dropout living at home with his mom and dad.

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He also brought in a law that guaranteed the right to free and compulsory education for children between the ages of 6 and 14, significantly reducing the school dropout rates.

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In the first three years, T-levels have faced delays, high dropout rates and an exam board being fined £300,000 over "major failings" with the papers.

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