Dissertation Topic

My Dissertation topic is Motivation and Reading Achievement for High School Boys.  I came up with this topic because I teach in an Alternative High School and have observed that there is a discrepancy between boys success rate and the fact that because they are not motivated to read it has impacted their achievement.  Since this problem is evident it has caused them to repeat grades and to in the future have a low graduation rate which is a direct trickel down factor of dropping out because they cannot read.  I am hoping to use the study to highlight aproaches that could help target, isolate and fix the problem by finding ways to treat it.  I am also welcome to any suggestions and findings anyone might have in this area.

Problem Statement

A number of ninth grade boys are not succeeding in reading because of lack of motivation to read.

Research shows that ninth grade boys are not motivated to read so it affects their achievement. Boys who have no motivation to read have low test scores on standardized tests. In particular boys in high school tend to read less and it impacts their achievement in other content areas as well.