Dropout crisis hurts Texas economy

The start of school should bring a renewed sense of purpose and optimism. Who isn’t hopeful about the future as our students start a new school year loaded with promise, potential and 40-pound backpacks? However, a new report from the Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University should give all Texans a pause at the beginning of this school year.

The new Bush School report, titled "The ABCD’s of Texas Education: Assessing the Benefits and Costs of Reducing the Dropout Rate," provides a politically balanced look at just how much the Texas dropout rate costs the state’s economy.

The Bush School’s savvy researchers targeted the class of 2012 — this year’s high school sophomores — for examination and found that the dropouts from just this one class of Texas students will cost our state up to $9.6 billion in lost wages, increased welfare and jail expenses over their lifetime. That’s almost $10 billion year in and year out.

With the student population continuing to increase alongside Texas’ demographic shift, that figure will only grow.

Texas can no longer afford the luxury of ignoring our dropout crisis. The report, commissioned by United Ways of Texas, must be a somber wake-up call for Texas parents, educators, clergy and business people.

Texas stands to waste upwards of $100 billion in lost economic potential and unwarranted welfare and jail costs in just the next decade unless it grapples with the dropout crisis with genuine commitment and focus. If any other sector of our economy stood to lose so much money, Texans would be in justified uproar.

In case you are not disturbed enough by the costs of the high dropout rate, the report also examines the benefits of a high dropout rate, difficult as they might be to imagine or to discuss. A dirty and uncomfortable little secret of the high dropout rate is the savings generated by not having to educate thousands of students each year. The authors of the report estimate that all those dropouts actually save the state up to $1.1 billion per year in teachers, facilities and other costs.

Let’s hope our lawmakers take these figures into account as they gear up for another thrilling installment of the Capitol’s least favorite and most complex soap opera: public school finance reform.

The conspiratorially minded might think that the annual brouhaha about which dropout numbers are accurate is a deliberate effort to prevent a deeper conversation about why so many students drop out in the first place, and what we can do to stem the flood. Why bother worrying about the implications when it’s so much more fun (and politically advantageous) to focus on assigning blame for one of the state’s most glaringly obvious problems?

Now that we have the Bush School’s important and objective findings, surely we can all get together to do something about our dismal dropout rate. The Texas dropout rate is itself a political hot potato with business and advocacy groups blasting the dropout calculations produced by the Texas Education Agency and politicians of all stripes pledging to combat the dropout epidemic without committing the energy and resources necessary to address both the academic and social needs of our students.

"The time for action is now," said Traci Wickett, President and CEO of the United Way of Southern Cameron County and Chair of the United Ways of Texas Board of Directors. "In all Texas communities, but particularly in the Rio Grande Valley, future economic vitality depends on the creation of an educated and skilled work force. That work force needs at minimum a quality high school education if our state and region are to prosper in the coming decades."

Reducing the dropout rate is not going to be easy and will require much more than a handful of government programs. Texas needs a culture shift that emphasizes and rewards education. For example, employers of large numbers of teenagers in one Texas community have banded together to reduce nighttime working hours and encourage the completion of homework on school nights. These businesses know that today’s lower-wage teen workers can be either tomorrow’s middle class consumers or tomorrow’s public assistance recipients.

Students and parents will need the help of our entire state if we truly intend for more of our students to fulfill the excitement and promise of the start of a new school year. Given the consequences of inaction, Texas can afford nothing less than an all-out effort to move beyond the rhetoric of reducing the dropout rate toward actually ensuring that more of our students graduate from high school ready for the challenges of post-secondary education, work and life.

The clock is ticking and the dollars are slipping through our fingers.

Jason Sabo is senior vice president of public policy for United Ways of Texas, based in Austin.