Media: "One in Ten US High Schools is a 'Dropout Factory'": It Must be a Slow News Day
Surprise! One in ten US high schools fails to graduate a huge chunk of its students. Even more amazing, most of these students are culled (pun intended) from minority populations.
Even more amazing is that this "bit of wisdom" from the "Tell us Something we didn't Know" department passes off for news.
It must be a slow news day if this issues plays in the media.
Another revelation: School districts and states under report the "dropout problem."
Sidebar
Old News!
"Every year, approximately 1.2 million students-that's 7,000 every school day-do not graduate from high school on time. Nationwide, only about 70 percent of students earn their high school diplomas. Among minority students, only 57.8 percent of Hispanic, 53.4 percent of African American, and 49.3 percent of American Indian and Alaska Native students in the U.S. graduate with a regular diploma, compared to 76.2 percent of white students and 80.2 percent of Asian Americans."
Source:
Alliance for Education's: About the Crisis article
Guess who Else is Dropping Out
There is no fooling you, is there? You guessed that new teachers are dropping out, maybe even at a pace to outstrip the students.
Sidebar
Here are some statistics from the Alliance for Education
"At the same time, teachers are leaving the profession at an alarming rate: 14 percent of new teachers leave by the end of their first year; 33 percent leave within three years; and almost 50 percent leave in five years. Estimated conservatively, American schools spend more than $2.6 billion annually replacing teachers who have dropped out of the profession. Many analysts believe that the price is actually much larger and point out that the loss in teacher quality and student achievement must be added to the bill."
Source:
Alliance for Education's: About the Crisis article
And, the reason is the same: Everyone likes (even thrives on) success.
Everyone likes how success feels, likes how success structures their self-talk in positive ways, likes how other people dole out praise, affection and admiration when they achieve success.
The "dropout rate" (best described as school leaving rate) is a measure of success. Aren't 70% of our students "sticking it out" to the bitter end (graduation)?
Here is the problem: For all the money we spend on education, our goal of educating every student remains elusive.
Where the "Coming up Short" States are
The states with the largest percentages of "Dropout Factory" high schools are the states with the largest minority populations. No surprise!
These also tend to be states with the largest populations.
State-by-State Breakdown of "Drop Out Factory" Schools
Big Bureaucracy: No Solution in Sight
Hope that the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) can be revised to address this problem remains a bureaucratic fantasy. Wishful thinking heightens expectations, solves little.
Looking to the Feds to solve local issues by sanctions against teachers hasn't worked. What evidence is there that the "same soggy solutions" will spark levels of change that are large enough to be observed and measured?
But, what if Big Bureaucracy is the source of the problem…due to inept and inefficient management, red tape, and the inability to achieve goals?
Or, what if Big Bureaucracy really wants public schools to appear to be failing so that government money can be funneled into church schools?
Sidebar
Classroom Toolkit has addressed the problem of The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) and the real motive of fostering church schools at public expense so many times that listing them here is unwieldy. Simply launch this search link, and scroll down through the list of articles about NCLB.
Search of Classroom Toolkit articles on NCLB
Big Bureaucracy: The Cause of the Problem?
Most news coverage deplores the situation, and reports the same "ByLine."
But the Black Commentator™ digs deeper and "Tells it like it is."
Link to the "Black Commentator™
The "Black Commentator™ notes that one way to raise test scores for a high school is to ensure that students who can't pass the test leave school by the tenth grade…or holding them back in the ninth grade for three years, the skipping them to the eleventh grade.
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"The secret of doing well in the 10th-grade tests is not to let the problem kids get to the 10th grade."
Source of this strategy:
Washington Post
Education 'Miracle' Has a Math Problem
But since the Black Commentator™ focused upon the bureaucratic abuse of voucher systems as a way to subvert public education, they missed the second way that schools get students to pass the high-stakes tests, i.e., allow cheating.
Sidebar
Classroom Toolkit addressed this issue in the article, Say it isn't So! 50,000 Texas Students Caught Cheating on the State High-Stakes Test?
Public school students found cheating on the test, and public schools that fail to graduate huge percentages of students are "tailor-made" arguments for "incensed and outraged" politicians to use to demand that "We Do Something," even if that "Something" means "voucherizing" education and further weakening public schools.
"Dropout Factories" — Resources on the Web
Dropout Factory Story from MSNBC™
Google™ Search for "Dropout Factory" for Original Sources
Alliance for Education's: About the Crisis article
Classroom Toolkit Article: NCLB is up for Re-Authorization: Bend an Ear, Twist an Arm, Shake your Fist, or Kick your Congress Person's Derriere to "Muzzle NCLB" and Salvage Education
Classroom Toolkit Article: The High Cost of Dropouts: Rod Paige is Still the Voucher-System's "Front Man"
Classroom Toolkit Article: NCLB: Up for Reauthorization, but "Not Up to the Task" of Benefiting Children
Washington Post Article: Education 'Miracle' Has a Math Problem
Blacks Pushed Down and Out
Johns Hopkins University: What your Community can do to End its Dropout Crisis
Education.Com™: Why Some School Districts Might be Happy About Dropouts
