Drop Out Factories

This past Thursday, March 24th, Cal. State - Los Angeles hosted an educational forum put on by the Civil Rights Project of Harvard University to discuss research about high school dropout rates in California. Some of the enormous disparities are highlighted below:

• Nearly half of the Latino and African American students who should have graduated from California high schools in 2002 failed to complete their education, according to the report.

• In the Los Angeles Unified School District, the situation was even worse, with just 39% of Latinos and 47% of African Americans graduating, compared with 67% of whites and 77% of Asians. The troubling graduation rates are most alarming in minority communities, where students are more likely to attend what researchers call "dropout factories."

• Statewide, just 57% of African Americans and 60% of Latinos graduated in 2002, compared with 78% of whites and 84% of Asians.

Unfortunately, even for the small percentage of Latino & African American students that do graduate, their preparation for college has been significantly damaged by these very same "dropout factories." Many of those students are at CSULA.

What we've had to come to grips with in our ministry is that teaching the Bible and making disciples of students necessarily involves righting this wrong. For us, this has included math tutoring & paper writing & reviewing, as well as seminars on financial aid and filing taxes. This is part, we believe, of what Jesus talked about in bringing "good news to the poor." Not just good news that heaven will be better than earth, but that the kingdom of heaven can, will, and does break forth to transform the kingdoms here on earth.

I'm still learning what this means on a systemic, social & political level in how we minister and influence change in the greater university & in our city. But it has already involved changing the structural and systemic leadership within our ministry. Now, not only do I care the concern for their spiritual development, but I long for the day when I get to celebrate with my students their academic development in their graduation.

"May justice roll down like waters,

and righteousness like an ever flowing stream."

--Amos 5:24