Webinar on Re-Thinking Student Aid

July 22, 2009

Application Deadline: passed

At a time when President Barack Obama insists the U.S. must improve high school graduation rates to help restore the country’s economic and political standing, new research shows that 17 states produce some 70 percent of the students who don’t graduate. What do these “make or break’’ states and schools have in common, and how can they be transformed? With federal stimulus dollars available to help turn around or replace failing high schools , what approaches will work to promote President Obama’s vision of a country where “dropping out is no longer an option?”

A new report from the Everyone Graduates Center at Johns Hopkins University and Jobs for the Future describes the characteristics of high schools that lose 40% or more of their students and provides detailed and useful context for journalists everywhere. What questions should reporters be asking of federal, state and local policymakers as they push toward Obama’s goal of transforming or replacing some 2,000 high schools?

Sign up for this Hechinger Institute on Education Webinar, one in a series the Institute has sponsored to help journalists understand and cover Obama’s new education agenda.

• Press Release: Graduating America

• Concentration and Spread of Low Graduation-Rate High Schools Across 17 States [pdf]

• Report: Graduating America: Meeting the Challenge of Low Graduation-Rate High Schools