Life, food, events, and community in Albuquerque, NM

High School Dropout

I’m a high school dropout.

There is no question that recent news about the high school dropout rates in New Mexico is disturbing. All children living in this state should have the opportunity to get a good education, and a high dropout rate undoubtedly harms our community.

Given this dire news about the status of education in New Mexico, Governor Richardson's Graduate New Mexico! initiative is good news.

But any time I read news about high school dropouts and the failures of these students, their families, teachers, or schools, I start thinking about all the high school dropouts I count as close friends or colleagues. We’re another part of this story.

There’s my closest friend from college, godmother to my two children, who is also a high school dropout. We forged our friendship struggling to comprehend Wittgenstein’s Blue and Brown Books in the college pub. My friend is an award winning writer, scholar, and advocate with a Master of Arts degree in early childhood education from a nationally recognized program. She’s even been invited to read her writing on NPR.

Another friend from college has parlayed her writing talent into a career. She dropped out of high school at age 16 to study Chinese in China. (She pulled a fast one over her parents). After she came back to the US with her baby daughter in tow, she attended college where she developed a zine for mothers who were not Ladies' Home Journal or Redbook readers. Shortly after that, her friends cheered her on as she debated with Newt Gingrich on national TV. Following graduate school at J school, she started writing books.

One of my colleagues at work is also a high school dropout. He’s also a professor who just this summer received an award for his cutting edge scholarship; he serves on numerous national boards related to his profession. Together we make up 20% of the section we work in. Lest you be dismayed by this revelation, rest assured that the other 80% of our cohort are high school graduates. (Oh, and we all have more than a few college degrees apiece – it is a requirement for all university faculty.)

I know many more high school dropouts – these are just the ones who came immediately to mind.

So what happened to us?

Are we just the exceptions to the rule?

I’m not so sure.

Gifted children drop out of high school for many reasons – research indicates that those from low SES are more likely to drop out. (Low SES = low socioeconomic status = less money, fewer resources, uneducated families). Programs like this may make a difference.

The high school dropouts I know come from highly educated families that are solidly middle class (maybe even upper middle class, depending on how you define the term). Yet in some way (race, ethnicity, disability, sexuality) we did not fit in or get the support that we needed in public school.

I’d like to think that things have changed today, but based on stories I hear from fellow educators, I’m not convinced this is the case.

You could argue that we figured it out (despite our dropout status) because of our privileged background. And there’s some truth to that.

I know that most high school dropouts, unlike the ones I hang out with, do not have graduate degrees.

Sheepskins are only one measure of success. Holding down a job, demonstrating responsible behavior as an adult, raising a family, and contributing to one’s community are other measures. I won’t deny that there is likely a correlation between high school graduation and some of these things, but that’s not the entire story.

In my field we often use two terms to discuss causation: necessary and sufficient conditions.

A necessary condition is always required. A thing cannot happen without this condition. I will resist temptation and use a rather dull example from this morning’s garden harvest:

To grow cucumbers, it is necessary that one must have water and light.

Water and light are always required to produce cucumbers. (Please note that for the purposes of this example, I am bracketing off discussions of logical possibility and distinctions between photosynthesis and chemosynthesis).

A sufficient condition is not always required for a thing to happen, but its presence can generate that a thing will happen. Consider the following sentence.

Cucumbers grow in the presence of soil, water, and sunlight.

Question: Looking at the statement above, is it necessary that given the presence of soil, water, and sunlight that you will (as in with 100% certainty) harvest cucumbers from your cucumber plant?
Answer: No. As any urban farmer knows, things like this thwart a gardener's best laid plans.

(This is about the time that one of my students asks me, “So what is your point?")

My point is this:

While a high school degree may be a sufficient condition to becoming a good citizen (this is, after all, part of the reasoning behind state sponsored education), it is not a necessary condition for becoming a good citizen. (I’ve given you three examples of people who have not satisfied this condition above. Four, if you want to count me).

Don’t get me wrong – I strongly believe that we should take whatever steps we can to ensure that children living in Albuquerque and beyond will have the skills that they need to be successful in life. As is obvious from the internets, critical reasoning skills should be part of this skill set. Completion of secondary education is one proven path to becoming a productive member of society.

As I have seen demonstrated again and again, it is not the only path.

What I always want to know after reading dire statistics about high school dropouts is this: what are these high school dropouts doing 10 years later? How many of them are good citizens? Are they productive members of society?

What are the factors that separate these “successful” dropouts from the others? And how can we apply this knowledge to assist and support those who do not have a high school diploma?

I started today’s blog post with the statement that I am a high school dropout.

Despite this deficiency, I like to think that I still contribute something to society. After all, my experience is what motivated me to go into education.

Tags: critical_thinking, education, high_school_dropout

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Comment by mombat on August 10, 2009 at 2:33pm: One of the best science teachers i ever worked with was the same sort of drop out. She worked at the zoo for a year after leaving school and then went to college to get a teaching certificate. We also have a familiy friend who is now a nurse, she dropped out and went from unpleasant wretch to happier kid almost over night, she had a whole cadre of friends and family calling and asking if she wanted help studying for the GED. I actually thought about collecting these into some sort of alternative education book.
I agree that these may not be the normal cases, but I think that there are so many more options now for kids to finish school.
It is my understanding the GED rates were not counted in the graduation rates.
I would be very interested to know how many dropcouts do go back to school or find a niche in which they can work and do become contributing members of the community.
I would hazzard a guess that support from family and friends has something to do with it.
Nice post.

Comment by Barelas Babe on August 10, 2009 at 2:47pm: Thanks Mombat. That's a great idea about compiling these stories into a book - it could be an updated version of Grace Llewellyn's Teenage Liberation Handbook.

I do think it is interesting that so many of the high school dropouts I know work in education...

Comment by Barelas Babe on August 10, 2009 at 2:50pm: Oh - I guess she's already updated her book. In any case, I'd love to read something like this with a New Mexico twist!

Comment by jes on August 10, 2009 at 4:24pm: I'm glad to see this discussed here. I hate the derogatory connotations associated with 'drop out.' To be sure, some number (who knows how many) high school drop outs go on to live lives of crime, welfare, unwanted children, yada yada. So do some number of graduates. Others drop out because they have better things to do; and still others may take a needed time-out and then drop back in. I worked in public education for a lot of years, and the assumption that one-size-fits-all and if-it- doesn't-you're-the-wrong-size just about drove me crazy.

Comment by QGal on August 10, 2009 at 5:18pm: Labels... bah! Seems to me if someone chooses to opt out of the system and obtain a GED, it shouldn't be considered "dropping out." That term seems to apply to someone who hasn't met the criteria for successfully completing the work, who is flunking out, too far behind the curve, etc. For those who are bored with school and would rather live life and most likely will continue on to higher education goals., they're just not in the same boat, IMHO. And I completely agree with you about "critical reasoning"... those skills are not often taught until the post-secondary level. I think it such skills need to be encouraged MUCH sooner, in order to better educate and prepare citizens to make informed, reasoned decisions... in order to qualify for a diploma OR a GED.

Comment by Granjero on August 10, 2009 at 6:02pm: Hi, my name is Ricky, and I'm a drop-out. Heh. Sorry, couldn't resist. Look, I dropped out of High School not because I was incapable of learning but because I was getting into too many fights and threatening coachs with beat downs.

I had issues. Less than ten years later, I graduated from college. I drive a delivery truck for a living these days, not because I'm not an outstanding and good looking member of the college degree clan, but because I like it.

My life would have been easier had I not been such an ass and stayed in school. I'm a pretty good guy for the most part.

Having said that, I don't know what the stats are, but from experience, drop outs suck more from the teat than those that gradeeeee-ate.

The fact that I decided to quit effects me more today than anything else in my past. Not giving up says a lot about a person. Says a lot about me. And says a lot to employers...

Just saying...

Comment by Michelle Meaders on August 10, 2009 at 10:38pm: Interesting info about smart kids who got bored with school, or it didn't fit them, and dropped out for a while.

I think the official numbers are only for kids who graduated in four years, so they can be misleading. If you took a shorter or longer time than that, you weren't counted. How many kids take college classes in high school and graduate early, or have to finish up in Summer School? How many left school because they were arrested and got behind? How many kids took all their classes and then failed the test they have to also pass to graduate? Or left early because they thought they would fail it?

I skipped half a year in Chicago schools and then moved to Florida, where they didn't allow that. So I went to summer school and graduated early.

Comment by Steve Whitman on August 11, 2009 at 11:22am: Many good points here. I think a big issue is who/what is counted as a "dropout". Obviously those who went on to college degrees got some sort of high school completion paper or they couldn't have gotten in to college. Its actually very difficult to keep track of the thousands of students entering and leaving schools for various reasons over the four years they're supposed to be in high school (family moves, transfers to private and/or charter schools, GED,s etc), so while I'll accept that far too many kids don't complete the basic education needed for most of them to get beyond low paying jobs, I don't think the "46% dropout rate" (or whatever the specific number was) is accurate. Realistically, it would cost a lot of money to develop and implement an accurate tracking system and this would not be considered money spent "in the classroom" but rather an increased administrative function. And we all know that would be an evil waste of taxpayer dollars ;^)

Comment by Laura on August 11, 2009 at 12:45pm: Barelas Babe, you're inspirational in many ways. Thanks for reminding us that education is not one-size-fits all. And neither is the answer to the question of how we keep kids in school.

The stats are quite skewed. Two dropouts in my husband's family just got their GEDs, many years after they left high school. Statistically, they'll never be counted as "graduates," no matter how much they deserve to be.

Comment by Barelas Babe on August 11, 2009 at 3:50pm: Actually Steve W - a high school diploma/GED was not required in my case. Believe it or not, UC Berkeley still takes students based on their college exam scores alone. UNM requires a GED. Interesting, yes?

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