Half of Olympia's low SES students drop out

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Half of Olympia's low SES students drop out

Submitted by Rick on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 11:12am.

I don't even know where to begin with this. From The Olympian:

Roughly 18.5 percent of students who start as freshmen in the Olympia School district fail to graduate from high school, statis-tics presented at an Olympia School Board study session Monday show. That's equivalent to 640 students from the total student body of about 3,500.

School board member Rich Nafziger said he plans to ask the board to adopt a goal in December of cutting the district's drop out rate in half in the next three years -- a goal several other board members said Monday they would support.

"Olympia is an affluent district in a lot of ways, but there are hundreds of kids who aren't making it," Nafziger said. "Our drop out rate is higher than it should be for our district."

The fact that 55.3 percent of Olympia's low-income students fail to graduate from high school is especially alarming, school board members said Monday. That compares with 37 percent of low-income students across Thurston County and 31.6 percent of low-income students statewide who don't graduate.

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Most likely the kids can tell

Submitted by Sarah on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 11:50am.

Most likely the kids can tell us what is wrong, why so many are dropping out. I know that bullying can be intense, school district is trying to address this, but more needs to happen.

Challenging situation, because when bullying and abusive behavior is taught at home, how much can school do?

We're going to blame bullying

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 12:06pm.

We're going to blame bullying?

What is your take on the situ

Submitted by Sarah on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 12:10pm.

What is your take on the situation, what is causing low income kids to drop out?

It's personal choice. Some m

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 12:19pm.

It's personal choice. Some may decide that working now (and maybe getting a GED) is a better option than graduating high school, since college could be unlikely (either because of choice, cost, grades, aptitude scores, et cetera).

Others may get into drugs or alcohol, not really making school a priority.

And then others are simply making a stupid decision, not caring about school because they may not realize the consequences of not having a high school diploma.

Citing external pressure to drop high school is a cop out. High school was a recent enough experience for me that I can tell you bullying is rare.

Are nasty comments made? You bet. Kids are the most ruthless breed around. I never saw a continued harrassment of someone and certainly not to the extent that someone would drop out of school over it.

If you simply inform administration the problem will be handled.

But not all kids are ruthless

Submitted by Robert Whitlock on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 2:22pm.

But not all kids are ruthless. Why are some ruthless when others are not?

Does it have to do with different styles of parenting?

Dependence on a program of strict disciplinarianism will only cause an increase in resentment among the kids, because they don't feel respected or listened to.

Sarah is right. The answer is to ask the kids what the problems are, and what they think would make it better.

With kids, when in doubt - ask questions.

Sounds like TFI is closer to

Submitted by FPK1 on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 2:33pm.

Sounds like TFI is closer to H.S. age and has a better view of the question. The problem is too much talk not enough action. I heard the same thing back in the 60s from the kids who are now the parents. So what happened?

You did not see it, does that

Submitted by Sarah on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 3:05pm.

You did not see it, does that mean it did not exist?

We can certainly agree to disagree on this.

Is my experience also valid, as a mother and community member?

Nope, that doesn't mean it di

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Wed, 11/23/2005 - 12:46pm.

Nope, that doesn't mean it didn't exist. In fact, I'm sure there were some instances and I'm sure that some people probably had a horrible high school experience.

Is it an epidemic sweeping the school system? I would say no.

We, people, are in many ways no different from animals. Since the beginning of time there has been bullying, harrassment, and other forms of individuals trying to assert themselves as the dominant member in the party.

It's social Darwinism.

EDIT: Yes, your experience is valid. This isn't a subject where an experience would be invalid, since the vast majority of us probably went to school with peers. Even if one were homeschooled, they could talk about the positives and negatives of that as it is related to this subject.

I think one of the biggest pr

Submitted by FPK1 on Wed, 11/23/2005 - 1:28pm.

I think one of the biggest problems with the kids and parents of today that I see is that they are almost always given an excuse for underperforming. I have three kids who went through the public school system and are now all in colleges. I'm not trying to blow my own horn on this either. This was a team effort (parents & kids) and they were all given expectations to meet as students. We need to stop making excuses that range from I don't feel good about myself to the gamma rays got in my head. The working world doesn't care what your problems are, they care about performance.

Like Rick, I hardly know

Submitted by V-ster on Wed, 11/23/2005 - 11:51am.

Like Rick,

I hardly know where to begin with this topic. This is a very complex issue, to which we can say, "yes" to nearly every opinion mentioned.

While dropping out is a personal choice, I think that we need to look at the underlying issues. Getting into drugs and alcohol probably isn't the primary issue (I see this as a symptom)...going deeper, what kinds of supports do this kids have? How is the school environment structured to provide the support and safety needed? How are families supported in their parenting functions? What about how we value our youth? Not so long ago, teenagers had meaningful engagement in our world. So, if our society is structured in a way that they aren't allowed to participate, than we have to face the problems that this restriction creates.

TFI: Perhaps you didn't see much bullying, but it does happen in really big ways, covertly and overtly. I have a son who dropped out largely because of the bullying. He saw it in very big ways against vulnerable students. My son has always had an eye out for the under dog. At one point he stood up for one vulnerable student--the bully was tripping the student repeatedly in a supervised classroom--(In this instance the vulnerable kid was disciplined for disrupting the classroom), and my son ended up getting his face kicked in after school off of school property. The same kid continued to harrass him. How does the administration handle it? Well can they really with a fair process? This activity did not happen on school grounds under the administations authority. It becomes a civil assault issue. Was the perpertrator ever punished for picking on vulnerable kids? No. Because without and adult witness, than it becomes word against word. (Also Note: In Washington State, we've passed several anti-bullying pieces of legislation. If it's not a problem, than it makes me wonder why the legislation exists?)

Back to Rick's local story post, equal to the educational system and environment, meaningful involvement, and valuing our youth, I suspect the problem of classism exists.

A local school principal once

Submitted by Sarah on Wed, 11/23/2005 - 12:10pm.

A local school principal once told me that unfortunately bullying happens frequently, and that bullies often escape consequences while the targets often end up disappearing somehow. They drop out.

A mother of a biracial daughter told me that in the Oly school district her daughter was abused, bullied, treated cruelly. In Thurston, she thrived.

Classism, racism, homophobia, and more exists and people suffer.

What I have seen over the yea

Submitted by OlyCop on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 9:01pm.

What I have seen over the years of seeing many homes, the lack of strict discipine coupled with love, yields kids involved in criminal and/or anti-social behavior. The family economics of the home rarely is an issue. Poor people can raise good kids as easily as rich people. Its not about money, its about involvement in your kids lives.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, TFI is on the mark.

I graduated high school 9 1/2

Submitted by Rob Richards on Wed, 11/23/2005 - 2:25pm.

I graduated high school 9 1/2 years ago. I barely graduated, I may have even had the lowest GPA in my class. I never dropped out, basically, just because. What I do remember is how well I did in elementary school compared to high school. In elementary school, all I had to do was pass tests, I hardly ever did homework for years, and was always in trouble for it. But I aced the tests and advanced.

When I got to high school, things changed. Now I had to do homework as well as pass the tests. I still passed the tests, and did enough homework to get a passing grade, which means a 'D'. One thing I remember clearly is the classes that I did well in. These are the classes I had fun in, and was challenged by. My freshman english teacher, who I think saw that I needed a challenge, put me in for sophomore honors english, after I failed freshman english. I loved honors english, and passed with flying colors. The same freshman english teacher, Mrs. Keddington, taught journalism, and I was on the school paper my entire high school career. I loved this, the independence and challenge that was given to me was an environment I thrived in. Other classes and teachers just didn't do this for me.

What I'm trying to get to, is that from my perspective, school just isn't challenging enough. It is not geared toward individual students, it's geared toward the entire school's performance in standardized testing. It's kind of like someone going on a diet. There are all of these diets out there that claim to make you lose weight, but they are not designed for you. They are designed for thousands of people. Maybe millions. Schools should do away with the system of testing and reinvest in the individual student. Find out what Billy needs, what Susie needs. Challenge Billy and Susie in a way unique to them. I think, as an added bonus, fostering a culture of individualism would do away with a lot of bullying that goes on.

Rob, that's the parents job.

Submitted by FPK1 on Wed, 11/23/2005 - 3:43pm.

Rob, that's the parents job. My wife and I literally selected the teachers my kids would have. I'm sure the school wasn't happy to see us at times, but they were our kids and we needed to look out for their best interest. One of the things we realized early on was that there were no shortage of parents that wanted the schools to do everything to include instilling values.

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