Boston councilors push city-sized move to up the age for dropping out

In the wake of several state-wide failures to raise the dropout age from 16 to 18, some are seeing a place for a city-scaled solution. 

Boston City Councilors John Connolly and Tito Jackson have seen efforts to raise the age at which students may choose to leave school stagnate at the state capitol. Discontent to wait for state legislators to make a move, they're pushing forward locally.

“We don’t let 16-year-olds vote or buy alcohol, but we allow them to decide not to stay in school; it doesn’t make sense,’’ Connolly told the Boston Globe. “We don’t want a 16-year-old closing off his or her future by making a hasty decision.’’

Rebekah Richards, chief academic officer of The American Academy, which works with high school dropouts across the nation (and sponsors this blog) says such law changes are a nice start.

But that's about it.

"The act of dropping out of school isn’t about age — it’s about options," Richards writes. "Students drop out when staying in school becomes more difficult than leaving."

Simply saying students can’t drop out doesn’t mean they won’t drop out, Richards argues. 

The Boston School Department has made a number of other changes to keep more students in school, including offering of more online courses, but its students remain more than twice as likely to dropout as their peers from the rest of Massachusetts, according to the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

Do you believe that "not 'til you're 18" dropout laws work? Comment here or drop us a line at editor@nodropouts.org