Today's High School Students Less Likely to Graduate Than Their Parents

[MountainLaurel]

Young people in the United States are less likely than their parents to earn a high school diploma, and states are not doing enough to reverse this trend, according to a new report released Thursday.

Federal law requires states to set goals to graduate high school students in time. However, nationally, one in four students fails to graduate in time. And for Black and Hispanic students, the rate is one in three.

“At a time when most middle-class jobs require more just a high school education, many states seem willing to accept remarkably high dropout rates,” says Anna Habash, author of the report “Counting on Graduation” from The Education Trust, an educational advocacy organization.

The federal No Child Left Behind law requires all states to set benchmarks for graduating high school students. However, the law leaves it up to states to set goals, and the report found many states aim very low:

http://diverseeducation.com/artman/publish/article_11876.shtml

I knew things were bad, but :wow:

[dkf]

1. I thought NCLB encourages drop outs because then it doesn't

count against you.

Am I wrong?

[munyabuhoro]

12. you are not wrong

not you are right

[goddess40]

2. You can get the same job with or without a HS degree

so if you know you can't afford a college or tech school degree what's the point. I don't know if kids think that far ahead but their parents do and if they aren't talking about keeping up your grades and being involved in other way the kids lose sight of the goal.

[Nikia]

6. Not always

Since decent paying jobs not requiring a degree are rarer, companies can be pickier. If a company has more applicants than jobs, they will preferentially hire the high school graduates over the drop outs. This especially true for people with little or no work experience. One of our aquaintances who is a 21 year old drop out, has not been able to get a job paying over $7.00 after applying everywhere for the last three years even while other friends who are high school graduates get those jobs paying a few dollars per hour more. She doesn't even get an interview. I think that employers make a lot of negative assumptions about someone who doesn't have a high school diploma or at least get a GED.

[morningglorysunday]

3. In some cities the numbers are far worse

50% dropouts or more. And the scary part is that it isn't just a case of qualifying for a particular type of job, but even having basic skills like rudimentary math and reading abilities.

[Poppy Adams]

4. I really disagree

I am in high-school now, AND almost every single decent human being that has a life and has friends and is "genuinely intelligent" have all dropped out or will in the near future.
so the previously stated percentages are off by allot

[GSPowner]

9. well good luck with that...

As the economy gets worse there are more people in the potential job pool and less of a chance for lower skilled and lower trained people to get a job. So employers when they do have to hire they will have plenty of options and will be selective and odds are will choose the higher trained candidates. It will be an employers/buyers market, and why should they not be selective they need to be smart shoppers too?...right? I am in recruiting and I place CPAs and finance professionals and even in this line of work a Bachelors degree and a CPA are no longer always enough. Being a former CPA and hiring manager I never even considered someone that did not at least complete high school for an entry level clerking position. In fact I never hired anyone that at least did not have an associates degree...and then the rate was less than $14 per hour...it has been so long I have forgotten exactly but the point is you will NEVER close a door that would not otherwise be open had you not had a degree.

There are many studies but in general you can earn up to 5x as much or more per year more by having a degree. Graduate fro HS and get a good state college bachelors degree...it is your best investment.

[musical_soul]

5. What gets me....

is that it's so important to have a HS Diploma now. Even McDonalds is getting picky. From what I understand, some of those kids have another idea though. It's not always legal. :(

[Nikia]

7. I agree

See my above post.
Most employers around here, especially those that pay significantly more than minimum wage, do not hire high school drop outs without GEDs. Some middle aged adults with significant job experience might get hired in some cases, but not teens and young adults without much experience.

[munyabuhoro]

15. coucou

i agree with you

[jkalember]

8. Fix the middle schools, lower drop outs

URGENT: Focus on middle schools, differentiate, create “schools with a school” or “small learning communities” and make middle school relevant to the kids so they can get through high school!
I teach literacy to middle school students, and have taught social studies and other subjects, with most of my experience in “underprivileged” schools. With the HS dropout rates a national disaster, it is time to start making the educational experience relevant to middle school kids. There are several good reasons:

The traditional academic curriculum is not appropriate for at least 20-15% of underprivileged students. Some simple can’t do well hour by hour, looking at the back of some kid’s head, listening, reading, and testing. The numbers bear this out. We need to re-engineer our middle schools into differentiated small learning communities that can teach kids the skills they need to survive in evolving high schools and other vocational programs.

Teacher effectiveness will be dramatically increased if their students are “appropriate”. Academic teachers will have kids who can handle academic activities, small learning communities will take those who can’t and provide them with a relevant educational experience to prepare them for high school. Absent a few kids in each class, my colleagues tell me they would be much more effective.

New teacher attrition will be mitigated if we drive small learning communities into our middle schools. The bane of all new teachers, especially in difficult schools, is “classroom management”. Anything that can make dealing with 6-8th graders easier will obviously keep more good people in middle school teaching.

Re-engineered middle schools will prepare students with a high probability of dropping out of high school with a chance to get their diploma. How? By making their middle school experience relevant to their life, integrating it with what they will face in high school, and giving them the skills to succeed in any of the pathways to a high school diploma and beyond.

Admittedly, this piece lacks a great many details, but what I am suggesting here is not new, there are many successful models out there, but middle schools have to a large degree not been “integrated” into a process designed to maximize the chances for all kids to get through high school. As an example, two years ago at the high school our kids attend, one in four freshmen dropped out of school. Obviously, education wasn’t high enough on the list, and they were making the connection between life and school. Neither is the school. Time to change.

[Taitertots]

10. Don't these kids have parents?

Where are their parents?
My parents taught me more than school ever did. Where are these absent parents and what is going to be done to get them to start raising their children. I almost dropped/failed out of high school, but my parents wouldn't let me. They made every effort to keep me going and I graduated. Now I have an associates degree and I'm working toward an engineering degree. I paid out of pocket to go to community college to get my grades up so I could get into a university.

I think this is a problem of poor parenting. These parents need to be held accountable for the failing of their children. We need the social stigma and cultural push to get parents acting right again. You are a bad parent if your child doesn't graduate. You are a bad parent if you don't read to your children, don't teach your children, and accept failure. It is not the schools responsibility to do everything to raise your children.

edit:switched words so it would make sense

[munyabuhoro]

13. there home

there taking education from their mother

[bluestateguy]

11. It might be time to consider legislation (at the state level) mandating that you finish high school

Just throwing that out

[munyabuhoro]

14. together

am with you supporting obama

[lightningandsnow]

16. In Canada, many students take a 5th year of high school.

It's not the same as dropping out, and many people do it to improve their grades and get into better universities.

The statistic is kind of disturbing, but there is a huge difference between taking an extra year or semester (and "not graduating on time") and not graduating at all.

[Nevernose]

17. Teachers don't give kids permission to drop out.

Only parents can do that.