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The
Herald
Published: March 20, 2001
'Guard program pushed for school dropouts'
By Susanna Ray and Eric Stevick,
Herald Writers
OLYMPIA - State Rep. Dave Schmidt put on two hats Monday afternoon as he pushed legislation to help high-school dropouts turn their lives around.
The Bothell Republican's bill would make Washington the 27th state to participate in the National Guard's Youth ChalleNGe program, which helps youths who have quit school to return to their studies or get good jobs. It's a 51/2-month residential program, followed by a year of once-a-week mentoring.
Schmidt, who is a staff sergeant with the National Guard and has two children in high school, has testified at two public hearings for his Substitute House Bill 1646 (available on the Web at www.leg.wa.gov) and managed to get it passed unanimously in the House last week.
Bill details
Dave Schmidt's Substitute House Bill 1646 (available on the Web at www.leg.wa.gov) was passed in the House unanimously last week. The Bothell Republican's bill would make Washington the 27th state to participate in the National Guard's Youth
Challenge program.
The costs: About 80 percent of high-school dropouts get into trouble with the law. Jail costs $39,000 per inmate per year, the Youth ChalleNGe program costs only $14,000 per student. The state pays 40 percent of that cost, and the federal government would pay the rest.
The rewards: A participant is considered successful if he or she is gainfully employed or back in school one year after the program's end. The program, began in 1993, has an 86 percent success rate.
But the repetition obviously hadn't dampened his enthusiasm when he introduced the proposal to the Senate on Monday. Of all the bills he's working on this year, Schmidt is most excited about this one, he said recently when asked to reflect on the first half of the legislative session.
"It's a brand new program that really has an opportunity to turn kids' lives around," he said.
Statewide, the school dropout rate was around 4 percent in grades nine through 12 in 1998-99, the latest year statistics were available, according to the state Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. During October of that year, 11,785 high school students dropped out of school.
About 80 percent of high-school dropouts get into trouble with the law, Schmidt said. That would have been about 9,400 students in the '98-99 school year with the possibility of going to jail.
But whereas jail costs $39,000 per inmate per year, the Youth ChalleNGe program only costs $14,000 per student. The state would be responsible for 40 percent of that cost, and the federal government would pay the rest. At a time when budget woes have made lawmakers wary about new programs, however, there's some concern that the National Guard program would take money away from current alternative education service providers.
But Larry Johnson, principal at Marysville Alternative High School, said he' d like to see more options available for at-risk students. While many MAHS students fare well, as above-state-average 10th grade scores on a statewide reading exam would indicate, many struggle just to stay in school. At MAHS, enrollment hovers around 280, but the number can be deceiving. In reality, roughly 500 students enroll at various times during a year.
"It's like having a five-foot net, the bigger and more opportunities we have, the more we can catch," Johnson said. "They need to hook into something that can pay a decent wage some day."
That's exactly what the ChalleNGe program's goal is. A participant is considered successful if he or she is either gainfully employed or back in school one year after the program's end.
Under those standards, the program, which began in 1993, has seen an 86 percent success rate among its 26,000 students, Schmidt said.
Peter Finch, principal at Granite Falls High School, said many students could improve their lives with more structure.
From a 10-minute video produced by Oregon's Youth ChalleNGe leaders, it's obvious that structure and discipline abound in the military-style program.
The video shows teens tightening already-taught sheets on their beds, studying, chopping wood, doing chin-ups and crawling, climbing and swinging their way through obstacle courses.
"Unfortunately, there are a lot of students who don't have a lot of structure in their lives," Finch said. "All kids need structure. They need boundaries, and they need to be enforced. And I think they understand that. This sounds like a good opportunity to give some students more structure."
You can call Herald Writer Susanna Ray at 360-586-3803 or send e-mail to ray@heraldnet.com
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