High School Dropout Factory

Recently, I was reading How to Identify a High School Dropout Factory (U.S. News and World Report). I haven’t quite decided how I feel about what was presented—need to do a little more research—but the article was interesting. It suggests 5 main areas of concern:

1. A hamstrung principal: The article says, “…the American system of giving teachers tenure makes for weak principals that have little authority to change school culture…”

2. High suspension rates: The dropout factory mentioned in the article has “a suspension rate of 108 percent, meaning that 2,500 suspension days were handed out to 2,300 students.”

3. Apathetic teachers: “There are some dedicated teachers who wouldn’t want to be anywhere else…but then there are other teachers who just show up.”

4. Overwhelmed students: “Offering many AP classes also allows schools to game some high school ranking systems that take into account the number of AP exams given to students….They require kids who are in AP classes to take the exams. They don’t pass any of them, and the school pays [for them to take the exams], knowing they’ll fail.”

5. Lack of technical training: “Sometimes, we have to be realistic about some of the students we’re teaching. Their goal is not to go to college; their goal is to get a job. We’re not training them for any jobs.”

I’ve had speaking engagements and consulting contracts at quite a few of schools that could be classified as dropout factories. The two main poisons I see eating away at those schools are: hopelessness and apathy. This is dangerous, to say the least, because research shows that people tend to be more motivated by the possibility of success than the probability of success.

In most circumstances, the odds are against a person or idea being successful. So, diligence and dogged determination to acquire the necessary skills and resources are crucial to the process. The desire has to be there and people have to believe that they can succeed regardless of how jacked up the system up is.

Some of the greatest leaders and movements in history have started and thrived in broken systems. The two things they all had in common were diligence and dogged determination.

Duncan Nugget® #9:
Diligence and dogged determination will drive you to seemingly unreachable destinations.

By the way, high schools aren’t the only dropout factories. The school highlighted in the article has a graduation rate of 30%. Well…I recently read about a 4yr. college that has a 15% graduation rate. Ridiculous.

Million-Dollar Question:
Do you believe that we can get rid of dropout factories and what are you determined to do about it?