EDITORIAL

Raising the high school dropout age is not a panacea. It will increase educational costs and create other challenges for school districts, and it won’t guarantee at-risk students will succeed.

But it will give young people a better chance to enjoy a higher standard of living. On balance, that makes it worth the costs.

The Kentucky Legislature approved a law in this year’s session — it went into effect Tuesday — allowing school districts to raise the age at which it is legal to drop out of school from 16 to 18.

On the first day they could, many school districts did, including the Paducah, McCracken County, Graves County and Marshall County school districts.

Under the new law, the Department of Education is giving a planning grant of $10,000 to the first 92 school districts that raise their dropout age to 18. But that $10,000 will not begin to cover the additional costs many school districts will incur. School officials say they need more funding for alternative programs for at-risk students to allow them to progress at their own pace and prevent them from disrupting classrooms. The harsh reality is that, under the new law, many students who are struggling in school and don’t want to be there will be compelled to remain.

“It is a funding challenge because some of those alternative innovations are more costly,” said Stu Silberman, executive director of the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence.

The age at which students can drop out of school has been 16 statewide since early in the last century. The law allows school districts to raise the dropout age as soon as the 2015-2016 academic year. Once 55 percent of the state’s districts raise the dropout age, it will become mandatory for every school district within four years.

By Thursday, 54 districts, or nearly one-third of the commonwealth’s 174 public school districts, had voted to raise the dropout age, exceeding expectations.

Gov. Steve Beshear and first lady Jane Beshear had pushed for raising the dropout age not only for the benefit of students but for the state economy. The governor emphasized the increased earning potential of those with high school diplomas over those without: “If the high school dropouts of 2009 had graduated, Kentucky’s economy would have an additional $4.2 billion in wages over those students’ lifetimes.”

That number, based on average earnings of high school graduates versus dropouts, is probably high. It is not realistic to assume that the law will boost the average achievement level of students who would otherwise quit school to the overall average of high school graduates.

But for those who quit school early not because they don’t want to finish but because of personal circumstances, the law could make all the difference.