Summit held to decrease area dropout rate

According to America’s Promise Alliance, a student drops out of high school every 26 seconds, which is the equivalent of over 1 million high school students dropping out per year.

The issue of motivating high school students to stay in school and go on to college was discussed at the Toledo Dropout Prevention Summit, a day-long event held at the Dana Conference Center on UT’s Health Science Campus on Thursday.

One of the main topics of discussion at the event was the educational gap between urban and suburban schools in Toledo.

“You have a disparity in quality of education in rural and urban areas compared to suburban areas,” said Greg Braylock, Jr., education impact specialist for the United Way of Toledo, and one of the major coordinators for the summit.

Braylock said making sure high school students are prepared for college after they graduate is just as important as making sure they graduate high school.

“We know that a lot of kids in America aren’t graduating from high school but the numbers are equally surprising when you look at the colleges that are saying kids [from] rural and urban areas are not prepared coming into college,” he said.

Terrie Cook, assistant director for the Upward Bound Program and parent of a local high school student agreed.

Cook said her son formerly went to a Toledo Public School but she later transferred him to Sylvania Public Schools.

“I see a difference in the parent involvement in the schools. I didn’t see that in TPS schools,” she said.

Cook said better parent involvement in the Toledo Public School system would help lower the dropout rate.

Some people who attended the summit said more charter schools should be opened up around the public school district.

The summit was a part of the Dropout Prevention Campaign started by America’s Promise Alliance, which was founded by Colin Powell and chaired by his wife Alma Powell.

There are 105 summits given nationally: one in each state, as well as 55 in local communities throughout the states.

The summit, which focused on high school dropout prevention and college readiness, was sponsored by the United Way of Toledo.

Braylock said there are too many students in Toledo who either do not graduate on time or drop out of school altogether.

To help fix this problem, Braylock said he helped organize six focus groups, with a wide range of students from across the Toledo community, to find out what their perspectives were on what can be done to lower the high school dropout rate in Toledo.

“I haven’t met a young person yet that said they don’t want to be successful,” Braylock said.

Jennifer Conley, youth opportunities coordinator with Summit YMCA, said a focus group has also been set up with the students she works with at the YMCA.

Conley said the focus group she works with provides tutoring, homework assistance and life skills workshops that show students how to write resumes and interview for jobs.

“I think if we provide that support to our youth, then those numbers will change,” she said. “I think with the group of people that are here today, this will provide an opportunity to brainstorm and come up with solutions to the different challenges that [students are] facing in school and their homes.”

At the summit, attendees were split into “breakout sessions” where they came up with steps to take in order to help today’s youth.

Among the attendees were parents, students, educators, business leaders, juvenile justice personnel, nonprofit organizations and religious organizations.

Some attendees found the brainstorming of ideas at the summit to be very helpful in making a brighter future for high school students and encouraging them to continue their education in college.

“I think this is a start to what is going to be a rewarding end,” Cook said.

“At the end of the day, education is not the sole job of a school; it’s not the sole job of a teacher or a principle to educate the people in the community, it’s the job of that community. The summit itself won’t solve anything at all. What it’s going to solve is the folks that are in these breakout sessions leadership ability in our community to follow through on those next steps.”

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