On a recent CNN Newsroom segment, Dr. Manny Rivera spoke with Heidi Collins about the high school dropout problem and its impact on the nation’s economy. “There have been a number of economic studies over the years that do link educational attainment to income,” said Dr. Rivera. The Alliance for Excellent Education released the study, The Economic Benefits from Halving the Dropout Rate: A Boom to Businesses in the Nation’s Largest Metropolitan Areas, which measures on a city-by-city basis the growth in jobs, home ownership, levels of spending and investment, and car sales that will result from cutting the high school dropout rate in half.

CNN NEWSROOM
January 12, 2010 Tuesday
10:00 AM EST

According to one group, 1,000 students drop out of school every day. Why some say these numbers are connected to our economy.

COLLINS: Issue number one now, and one group’s idea for explosive economic growth, keep kids in school. The Alliance for Excellent Education studied the high school dropout rates in the nation’s 50 largest metropolitan areas.

Here’s what they say they found. If the dropout rate is cut in half, those high school graduates would have earned more than $4.1 billion a year in extra income. The study says that would also mean $2.8 billion in additional spending. The alliance says that cutting the dropout rate in half would lead to 30,000 new jobs and $5.3 billion in economic growth.

Joining us now to talk about the dropout problem is Manny Rivera. He is – excuse me, Manny Acosta, a long-time educator who is with Global Partnership Schools. And I’m hearing again, pardon me, Manny, I’m hearing it is Manny Rivera, my apologies to you.

Let’s talk about this for a minute. I’d love to hear your reaction to this report. I know that you are just seeing it. What is your take-away here?

MANNY RIVERA, LONG TIME EDUCATOR: Well, I think there have been a number of economic studies over the years that do link educational attainment to income so I’m not surprised. Now, I haven’t looked exactly at what’s behind all these numbers that say they come up with.

I think but there’s another factor that we need to look at, and that is the fact that the cost to society, every time we incarcerate a young person who most likely has dropped out of school, that’s going to cost us anywhere from four to five to six times more annually than it would on a per pupil basis on an annual basis to educate young people.

COLLINS: Well, sure. I’m not sure that there would be – it would be hard to argue that, I guess, what we’ve been talking about this morning is, is where the jobs are.

RIVERA: So it’s -

COLLINS: For the kids who would be coming out of high school if in fact they were to stay in. Of course everybody wants kids to stay in and get their high school diplomas.

RIVERA: Well, I think we have to look beyond high school diploma today. If we want to be competitive as a society, we have to prepare young people to compete internationally, we have to prepare people to be able to go on to secondary education, beyond high school into colleges and universities or to be certified in some particular industrial opportunity. So I think there’s a lot of work that we need to do going forward.

COLLINS: What’s the main reason that kids drop out of school?

RIVERA: Well, you know, I’ve been at different forums and I’ve heard testimony from young people. And quite often they talk about the fact that they didn’t have support coming up through school, that there are certain issues that affected them, whether it’s an emotional issue, there are young people today in school who need all kinds of support. Things are tougher for young people. Getting to school safely is an issue in many urban communities.

In addition to that, we have to look at reducing the dropout rate more holistically and really prepare young people. We’ve got to start at an early age with early childhood education and we have to pay attention to everyone individually and make sure that they’re being successful as well as to look at their strengths and the assets that they bring to the school setting.

COLLINS: Yes, I mean, that all sounds good and very important. How do you do it? How do schools do that?

RIVERA: Well, there are different ways that you can look at. Number one, creating more of a student-centered environment so that when you assess a young student from the time they come into school, you’re not only looking at their reading scores or their math scores, but you’re looking at what they bring. You’re looking at what their interests are.

And then you create a student learning plan, a profile for the young person and you make adjustments in the program, you make adjustments in the curriculum, you make use of technology, you make sure they have the mentors, the tutors, whatever they need to get through school successfully. That’s what we’re going to have to do going forward.

COLLINS: Manny Rivera, we sure do appreciate your time this morning. Thank you.