Paying High School Students to Show Up for Class Is Brilliant

[Cafe MichelleP]

Paying High School Students to Show Up for Class Is Brilliant

Posted by Jeanne Sager

I'm pretty sure if you ask most adults if they want to go back to high school, they'd say you couldn't pay them money to make it happen. And yet that's exactly what a Cincinnati area high school is doing. They're paying teenagers cash money to show up for class.

It's such an odd idea it might actually work. Oh, I know what you're going to say. How dare they inject materialism into education? Knowledge is free! Education is to be treasured! Blah, blah, blabbity blah.

I'm completely sold on public education folks. And I still think this is a great idea.

The Dohn Community High School will be rewarding kids with Visa gift cards and creating small savings accounts thanks to a $40,000 incentive program. They'll get money not just for showing up on campus, but actually attending class and staying out of trouble. With 90 percent of the student population living in poverty, even small sums like $25 for seniors and $10 for underclassman has -- not surprisingly -- been welcomed by the kids.

And now for the kicker -- it's been so welcomed that more kids are showing up for school in a district where the graduation rate last year was just 14 percent. Quick, tell me something America, is it better to hold onto some idealistic notion that kids will thirst for knowledge or to actually have them show up for class and learn? I'm going to go with the latter.

I say this as your typical geek. I did love to learn. I did hunger to know more about the world. And if someone had told me I didn't have to go to high school, I would have gotten down on the floor and kissed their toes.

Even for kids who do love to learn, high school is not fun. It's a time when your body is a mess of hormones and you're being expected to get up much earlier than science says you should. Throw in bullies, piles of homework, and then all the crap at home -- especially in a poverty-stricken household -- and you have a powder keg just waiting to erupt.

Handing out money may sound crass, but for kids, it's a tangible reminder that what they're doing right now has value. It's in-your-face proof that solving quadratic equations may not seem like it's going to be useful at all, but there is a point in doing it. And, honestly, it's preparing these kids for college, when every minute of your education IS money, money being spent by your parents (or being loaded onto your shoulders via expensive student loans).

With each year's dropouts costing this country more than $200 billion (a figure that represents lost earnings and unrealized tax revenue over their lifetimes), is this really such a bad move?

 

[momofne]

Not sure how I feel about that. I could see it in this type of neighboorhood, so I guess it would depend on the school, house income etc. but not areas where the income is good.

[lucky2Beeme]

I dont like it. Probably because I never had problems with my kids wanting to go to school. My sons loved HS.

[fantasticfour]

I don't agree with this.  This is bribing kids to do what they were told to do in the first place.

[atlmom2]

That is absurd!!!  Bribing kids?  Hell no.  Mine show up every day because its their job to go to school right now.  Good grades is their payment.  Excelling and getting into a good school is the payment at the end of the tunnel. 

[CometGirl]

I'm against it.  School is mandatory until 16.  They need to learn early that there will always be something they HAVE to do whether they like it or not.

[boys2men2soon]

OMG!   Perhaps we should pay them to excercise, too!     The payment for going to school is an education!! An education will provide them with the skills to get a job.

And we wonder why youth feel so entitled, today.

[MrsBLB]

I can see both sides of this...  Some kids are troubled, some bored with classes and are not challenged enough.  Some love to go and learn.  I suppose if ALL were rewarded the same, then why not?  

[atlmom2]

Because its making this generation even more entitled.  Not a good thing.  Bored kids need more work or harder work, not money.  Troubled teens need counseling, not money.  The money wouldn't change the bored kids or the troublemakers either. 

Quoting MrsBLB:

I can see both sides of this...  Some kids are troubled, some bored with classes and are not challenged enough.  Some love to go and learn.  I suppose if ALL were rewarded the same, then why not?  

[PinkieRed]

Hmmm. I have mixed feelings about this. A 14% graduation rate is horrific! Obviously, something is broken somewhere in a school that has that low of a graduation rate, and I'm guessing giving the kids money to show up is a lot easier than fixing the real problems.

So, on the one hand, I'd say it's best to get to the root of the problems why so few kids are graduating - poverty, dysfunctional families, violence in the school, overcrowding, apathetic teachers or administration, or whatever. On the other hand, I know what it's like to grow up poor, and have to work 5-6 days a week during the school year to afford bus fare, lunches, clothes, etc., and I would have really welcomed something like this when I was in high school.

And maybe the kids who do manage to go to high school and thrive despite problems at home or in school should be rewarded. I don't know. Maybe if the financial incentive is working, why not let it be?

[drfink]

I guess depending on the particular school involved it might be ok.This school must have a family cycle of kids having parents that dropped out.If this can get a kid to graduate and,get a better job one that requires a diploma or GED then these kids will see the benefit of education and pass it on to their children...hopefully

I would never support it around here or for my children.The kids that attend our school just have to wake up and look around to see the benefits of getting an education.Even the kids like the young man that stole my sons phone and is doing service hours lives in a safe townhouse section ,has plenty to eat and appropriate clothing .This is because his mom has an education and has a decent paying job.