What Parents Can Do to Prevent Dropping Out

Here are some ways that parents, working with school administrators, counselors, and teachers, can help their children remain in school.

• Arrange for help with making up missed work, tutoring, placement in a special program, and/or a transfer to another shcool.
  

• Help them with personal problems, and/or arrange for professional help.
  

• Help them schedule work and family obligations so that there is also time to attend school.
  

• Help them understand that the choices they make - like marrying, becoming parents, failing courses, or behaving badly enough to get suspended - can seriously disrupt their ability to finish school.
  

• If students do become pregnant or parents, help them find school and social programs that will meet their special needs.
  

• If all else fails, help them find a GED program and encourage them to stay with it until they get an alternative high school diploma.
  

Earnings and Opportunities for Dropouts

The gap between dropouts and more educated people is widening as opportunities increase for higher skilled workers all but disappear for the less skilled.

• In the last 20 years, the earnings level of dropouts doubled, while it nearly tripled for college graduates.
  

• Recent dropouts will earn $200,000 less than high school graduates, over $800,000 less than college graduates, in their lives.
  

• Dropouts make up nearly half the heads of households on welfare.
  

• Dropouts make up nearly half the prison population.