Dropout Prevention Important to States

One-third of U.S. students who start their freshman year in high school do not graduate.

Those startling numbers make dropout prevention a key area policymakers need to address, panelists at the Dropout Prevention Workshop at the CSG annual meeting said Saturday.

“There is no more important issue you can address as policymakers than that of dropout prevention,” said Dr. Sam Drew, associate director of the National Dropout Prevention Center at Clemson University in South Carolina.

Drew and others stressed that dropout prevention efforts must begin before the student enters high school.

“You can’t only address dropout as a high school issue,” Drew said. “It starts early. Compounds over time and manifests in high school. That’s why we look at it as a high school issue.”

Drew said some of the policies his group has recommended have been successful, while others have not been. Too often, he said, states are looking for the silver bullet effect. He said addressing one aspect of the problem is a step in the right direction, but it takes a comprehensive approach to resolve the problem.

One school district that is taking a comprehensive approach to the problem is in Guilford County, S.C.

“Dropout prevention is not just about an individual student making decisions,” said Richard Tuck, director of School Social Workers, Dropout Prevention and Parent Outreach for the school district. “Although when it comes down to it, when a young person leaves school, it is at that point an individual decision.

“Dropout prevention … It’s everybody’s business.”

Among the comprehensive approach used by the school district  are early intervention, alternative and optional schools, a safe learning environment, service learning which is community based, career/technical education, leadership from the superintendent and school board, data analysis, professional development, family engagement and consistent/shared procedures.

Tuck said the school district wants to ensure that every student graduates, and the district has cut its dropout rate over the past few years.

But when students do drop out, there are programs that can help them achieve a diploma or GED. One such program is the National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Program.

Maj. Gen. Harry M. “Bud” Wyatt, adjutant general of Oklahoma, said the National Guard has three missions – the federal mission serving in wars, the state mission assisting in disasters and the community service mission, that of working with youth.

“The more we can do to change the lives of young people, the better we make our community. The stronger we make our community,” he said.

Wyatt related the story of sending one student to the Thunderbird Youth Academy, the youth challenge program in Oklahoma, after he had dropped out of school. While he recognizes that the dropout problem is a nationwide problem, helping an individual student makes a difference.

“You can’t solve the problem alone; you can’t solve it in the thousands. You have to solve it one at a time,” Wyatt said.

The National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Program works to achieve that goal on a daily basis.