Reframing School Dropout as a Public Health Issue

I wrote an article for my http://tutormentor.blogspot.com blog referring to an article written by a couple of health researchers. I'm not sure how good my comments are, but I encourage you to read the article by Nicholas Freudenberg, Dr.PH and Jessica Ruglis. You can find the link on my blog.

The writers provide statistics that show how the drop out problem is most severe in the nation's biggest cities. Since members of Classroom 2.0 come from various size communities, you might dispute, or agree with this claim.

However, I'd like to encourage you to consider what this means for public policy. If the dropout problem is greatest in only a few population centers, that means people in smaller cities may not be as personally connected to this issue. Without a personal involvement of enough people, it's unlikely that the public support will ever be gained for some of the changes recommended by people working with the drop out problem.

Thus, what can teachers do, using web 2.0 and communications, collaboration and service learning hours, to connect people beyond big cities with this issue, in ways that they become more involved, and we build the large scale support needed to find ways to keep youth in school and headed to careers.

My solution is to get more adults from business background involved with inner city kids via tutor/mentor programs that meet during the non-school hours at community based locations. As these adults connect personally, they become more engaged, and more likely to recruit other adults to become involved.

Do you have a suggestion for expanding the network?