Colorado is investing in school counselors to improve success rates for low-income students reports Hechinger’s Sarah Gonser. As of 2016, the most recent year for which data is available, graduation rates among participating schools had risen from 65 percent to nearly 80 percent, while dropout rates declined. Enrollment in high school career-and-technical programs doubled. Completion rates for the Free Application for Federal Student Aid increased to 54 percent, compared to 4

Andrew Cohn’s Night School follows three adults seeking high school diplomas in Indianapolis. The documentary features Greg Henson, a former drug dealer turned single father, Melissa Lewis, a 53-year-old grandmother, and Shynika Jakes, a 26-year-old Arby’s employee who aspires to be a nurse. The three students must pass the end-of-year Algebra I ECA exam in order to graduate. #dropouts #GED #highschooldiploma #Indianapolis

Compulsory education laws should be repealed argues Republican Paul Mosley, a first-year Arizona legislator and the father of seven. People used to see education as a privilege, he told the Arizona Capitol Times. “Now we basically force it down everybody’s throats. . . . the kids who don’t want to be there are a larger distraction to the kids who do want to be there.” “A dozen states are trying to keep children in school longer, from making kindergarten mandatory to raising t

High schools are inflating graduation rates and test scores by steering low achievers to alternative schools, reports ProPublica and USA Today. When they drop out, nobody’s accountable. Heather Vogell and Hannah Fresques focus on Orlando, Florida, where district schools, such as “A”-rated Olympia High, send their future dropouts to for-profit charters such as Sunshine High. Sunshine’s 455 students — more than 85 percent of whom are black or Hispanic — sit for four hours a day