Thousands of Kids Drop Out of High School Daily - How Are We Going to Solve the Problem?
On Tuesday and Wednesday this week, Sesame Workshop with Google and Common Sense Media are sponsoring Breakthrough Learning in a Digital Age, a conference of 200 thought leaders who will come together to discuss solutions to the literacy and dropout problems facing the nation. This blog focuses on the dropout crisis; the one yesterday focused on the literacy problems.
The dropout crisis is bigger than you might have guessed. While in some areas it has improved somewhat in the last year, in the country as a whole the problem is growing. Almost fifty percent of students in the fifty largest American cities drop out of high school. In some cities, there is over a seventy percent drop out rate.
A major consequence of the dropout rate is an increase in crime and and the prison rate. We spend more to keep prisoners in jail than we do to educate our students. Typical per-prisoner expenses run from $20,000-$50,000 per year while typical per pupil expenditures run from $7,000 to $20,000, averaging $9,000. This discrepancy needs to be addressed now and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is trying to promote change through incentives in the $100 billion education stimulus package.
The stimulus package can promote creativity and programs that will improve student performance. That is what Breakthrough Learning Forum is focusing on -- ways that technology will help support the efforts of teachers to individualize instruction for students; ways that technology will improve professional development for teachers; ways that technology can make the curriculum more relevant to the world today; and ways that technology can facilitate the teaching of reading. Everyone can participate in this discussion on Tuesday and Wednesday this week. See below.
Kids need 21st century skills if they are going to be successful in the world marketplace. That means collaboration skills, technology skills, computer skills and Internet search skills, just to name a few. Collaboration is an important 21st century workplace skill and it ties in well with student's innate drive to be social. Collaboration improves student motivation since kids like to work with each other. How can schools take advantage of students' love of social networks, mobile devices and collaborative writing tools like blogs and Google Docs to promote learning?
The Forum will address these issues and more. The nation's education leaders, entrepreneurs and policy makers will be there. We need real solutions now, not in a few years.
Get the entire agenda by clicking here.
Anyone with a computer can participate thanks to the the Webcast that will be broadcast live by Google on Tuesday, October 27 and on Wednesday, October 28 . The Forum wants to hear from everyone, so they will be using a new online tool called Google Moderator which allows anyone to submit questions for the speakers either before the conference or while it is happening. Click here to get Moderator.
People can also follow the conference on Twitter and read along with the narrative on the forum blog:
The line up of speakers is impressive. Here are just a few:
* Anthony Bryk, President Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching
* Karen Cator, Director, Education, Apple
* Elyse Eidman-Aadahl, Director K12 National Writing Project
* Kathy Hurley, Senior V.P, Pearson Foundation
* Ellen Moir, Director, New Teacher Center
* James H. Shelton III, Assist. Deputy Secretary, Department of Education
* Kavitark Shriram, Founder, Sherpalo
* Deborah J. Stipek, Dean, Stanford University School of Education
You can see their bios and all the others online here.
Dropping out is a no-win situation for students, for families, for employers, and especially for America as a country. We need everyone to work together to support teachers who in turn support the future -- our children. Join the dialogue and support efforts that will continue to address these problems after the conference is over.
Follow Esther Wojcicki on Twitter: www.twitter.com/heywoj
Esther Wojcicki: Sesame Workshop Gets Googley on K-12 Education Problems
The literacy issue is a major one; many kids today are not learning to read. If kids fail to learn to read by fourth grade (and about 40% do not learn), then their problems compound year after year.
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Schools need to assign all student to social workers, their need to be more social workers, and student rights advocate. Adminstrator pick and chose who they want in their school. Every child has a right to an education, those who have disciplinary problems include. its not the teachers , its High payed administrators, who dictate but don't want to work on helping distress kids. we attack the behavior but don't address the problem.
Most of high school is socialization and not needed , except for those kids who absolutely know they need a liberal arts background
community college , where they can pick up a trade or vocation , or prepare further for college if they so desire.The release from the stilted mores of high school will be welcome and kids will be treated as the adults they are becoming, not as children who must be in day care.
My daughter was bored to death in high school and bringing home poor grades. The minute we got her into a program where she could attend junior college, the grades went up and she became invested in her grades and work as it would transfer to college.
At least if kids have a couple years of college behind them it is more likely they will be graduating with a trade , which will make it possible to be able to work their way thru college , should they decide to go that route . And they will have saved thousands !
Thanks for your posts and information!!!!
Will add this to the blog I do at americansw
The real point of the dropout rate is that children no longer see a connection between going to school and success in life, especially if one's IQ is below 140.
Manufacturing has disappeared, one time good jobs like auto plants are little more than 1965's minimum wage in current dollars. Starting a small business immediately puts one in competition with national chains.
After working in both teaching and law enforcement I noticed that those who drop out are often the trouble makers who only make it more difficult for those who want to learn. They usually get their education later on in jail or prison....
My daughter dropped out of high school partway through her junior year, mainly because she was bored to tears being taught things she'd learned in 7th grade. She took her GED and is now a sophomore in college and getting straight As.
Public schools need tracking. The smart kids are bored and the kids doing poorly are promoted to the next grade regardless of whether they're ready. I know of two families in my city that had to fight the school board to get their kids held back. Meanwhile, my daughter dropped out because it was a waste of time for her; she wasn't learning anything new.
While I applaud the intent behind this conference, technology will only help make education more efficient and cost-effective, not deal with the social root causes of the "why" behind the drop-out rate. Poverty, lack of parent involvement, gang culture, a lack of role models, and a hopelessness rooted in "what's in it for me" all factor into the equation. How do we avoid having kids give up before they get started when today's headlines are consistently about average workers, college-educated and otherwise, getting screwed by corporate interests and Wall Street? Our government owes our children a chance to succeed by making sure a select few aren't gaming the system.
We also have to stop glorifying celebrities and athletes, stop buying into reality TV's version of success (getting something for nothing), and stop labeling hard-working students as "geeks". We need to celebrate those kids' achievements every bit as loudly as the quarterback who throws the winning touchdown. When it becomes cool to be smart and studious, we'll start making a dent on the dropout rate. For once, let's get our priorities straight and put our taxpayer monies where our mouths are.
I just have to get into this conversation and share my experience of the past 20 years as I taught the GED/Family Literacy program in Kentucky. Yes, the drop-out rate is terrible and I would encourage us as a nation to try and improve on the public schools which would also include parental involvement in schools and their child's education.
For 20 years I listened to the "reasons" they dropped out of schools that my students told me. A good many were due teen pregnancy. For some reason, public schools just do not accomodate young teen mothers that would like to finish school. Teen pregnancy is a problem that is not the fault of our school system, it is a fault of parenting.
I have worked with a variety of ages and intellect with my students. Some got their GED very quickly and were very bright. Most of those were young, 20 or younger. Does that tell us that the schools did something for them as long as they attended? Yes. Does that tell us that something happened that turned the student "off" as they sat in the traditional high school classroom? Yes. Does that tell us that we really need to look at our public schools, especially high school and improve the instruction? YES
Just thow more money at the problem. That seems to be the only answer the Left has when it comes to any problem.
I believe you missed the point, entirely. Monies that would otherwise go toward imprisoning our youth would be SHIFTED to educating them instead. Same pool of money; different priorities. Personally, I'd rather see the money spent on something future-forward and positive, than maintaining a failing status quo, wouldn't you?
Many are hopeless losers....
When underfunding is part of the problem, money is part of the answer.
Even you should be able to figure that out.
I have a pretty radical solution: legalize drugs.
Seriously. Most of the kids in my city, and probably any urban area, who drop out become pushers or get involved in the drug trade in some other capacity. Dealing is incredibly profitable and being involved with a gang/ drug org brings with it a sense of power that those kids wouldn't otherwise have graduating from high school and getting an hourly job at a retail shop. Sure, the life expectancy is short and the likelihood of being imprisoned is high - kids do not see that far ahead. Or everyone they know either died young or is serving a sentence. That's normal for them.
So, take away the profitability and power of the drug trade. Eliminating that considerable lure won't save every drop out, but it will certainly save a lot of them.
Well, legalize softer drugs at least and make heroin addiction an illness instead of a crime.
Crystal meth should stay illegal -- it's too darned nasty.
Whoa!! If drugs are legalized, then the corporate interests will do everything that they can to ensure that your kids become addicts. Haven't we learned anything from the likes of Budweiser and RJR Reynolds?
Instead, make possession legal. But distribution for money must remain illegal! Otherwise, the corporations will own the last vestiges of our souls we still retain.
Interesting. Would barter -- i.e, you bring the weed, I'll bake the brownies -- be allowable?
As a convicted murderer who used to deal drugs for a living said on TV, "The job allowed me to spend more time with my kids." *haha
In short, the current goal of making as much money with the least amount of work needed doesn't require a high school education.
First some questions:Are the classrooms rows of desk facing a talking head teacher? Is the curriculum the same old academic curriculum based on textbooks, multiple-guess tests? Do the classes meet five days a week & how much is paper/chalk/talk? How much high order thinking? Example from an Oprah "education series" knowledge of American history: "Name the first five presidents
(I am not a fan of myself)
First, all of our kids need to be enlightened to the truth about this country. Last night, my husband and I watched the PBS series on Race. Talking about powerful. Everyone needs to watch this series. He is working with 11th and 12th grade students, hoping to encourage them to attend college and this is part of his curriculum. To summarize, historically, the economic conditions haven't been equal. To say that the US government promoted economic advancement for whites, while denying it for others has caused much of the divide in this country, is putting it mildly. This country has done an injustice to the minorities of this country. When the playing field has never been fair and the real issues of race and economics haven't been dealt with then, we can continue to put our heads in the sand and wish these problems away, but they will continue to plague us. Please watch this series and talk about it with your family and friends. Black people definitely need to watch this series.
You will never solve any of the countries problems as long as you continue to bring class warfare into the debate.
I know what you mean. Some teachers teach stuff by rote -- it's just a job. Others actually like and understand the subjects they teach and will inspire at least some of the kids.
@Dallas Mike
Class warfare IS part of education. It's history (e.g., French revolution), current affairs (e.g., Wall Street) and the reason why some schools have Olympic size swimming pools and field trips to museums and some don't even have usable gyms or enough desks.
“Kids need 21st century skills if they are going to be successful in the world marketplac
Kids need 21st century skills if they are going to survive, what adult’s 20 th century thinking has resulted in.
“That means collaboration skills, technology skills, computer skills and Internet search skills”
and a realization. That what we need to be attempting is to work with reality. Rather than seeking to impose all manner of artificial understandings onto it.
“We need real solutions now, not in a few years.”
The moment has come to abandon hand-me-down spectacles that make us see things in only one prescribed way. Time to start seeing things for the first time, through our very own pair of eyes.
And if we do -- what will we see? I'm not understanding you here....
Some day we will look back and see how barbaric our school system is.....Aft
Everyone is going to college, coming out and working in payless, pacific sun, wherever! Yes those with the money or the in get to the Ivies and make connection
http://www
Many cities and states cannot afford, due to pressure from taxpayers and demands for other social services, to spend what is needed in many schools. Many towns and cities have lost the industrial and commercial jobs that supported a working class as well as tax revenue. Those in the suburbs will not support their taxes going to support inner-city and poor district schools. Many poorer district schools need systems that have extended class days.
We also need to deal with the far too common bad attitudes toward education that includes ones that going to schools is bending down to 'the man' ie: white corporate America as well as street gangs that have become defacto families to many young men and women.
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