This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Nov. 8, 2011 - To kick off a nationwide effort to combat the dropout problem among high school students, a town hall in St. Louis Monday night turned the tables and had teachers answering questions instead of asking them.
Based on their responses, the dropout dilemma could be one of the toughest tests they and their students ever face.
For example, moderator Gwen Ifill of PBS asked teachers in the studio at KETC, the Nine Network of Public Media, for their view of this question:
"Does your school effectively address students who lack reading skills or are performing below grade level?"
The replies: 15 percent said no, while 44 percent said some of the time, 23 percent said most of the time and 19 percent said yes.
After a discussion with panel members and teachers in the audience about the need for support from families and the community in efforts to make sure students stay in school until they graduate, Ifill posed a second question:
"In your own experience as a teacher, would you say that the level of community support in your school is high, medium or low?"
The answers confirmed what many members of the audience had expressed: 21 percent said high, 24 percent said medium and the majority, 55 percent, said low.
'What did you learn today?'
Those proportions underscored what one member of the town hall panel, Barrett Taylor, a literature teacher at Metro High School, emphasized: Teachers are with students just six hours every day, which may not always enough time to overcome or compensate for the problems the students have in the rest of their lives.
"Teachers get a bad rap in the news," he said. "The teachers I work with work hard every day to educate these kids. I think the parents have to help educate these kids. What we do at school is wonderful, but when they go back home, what is going on? Are the parents reading to the kids? Are they talking to their kids, asking simple questions, like what did you learn today?"
He added:
"When they come to school and I'm talking about 'Beowulf' and 'Things Fall Apart,' they can't hear that. They think, what is going on in my house? What can I eat? My mom might be strung out on drugs. I may have to work to help my brothers and sisters out."
Stephanie Krauss, who created Shearwater High School, a charter school in St. Louis designed to help students whose education has been interrupted, said highly trained, accountable teachers can help combat some of those influences.
"We know the power of a caring adult," she said. "We've heard it for years because we know it works. One of the things we talk about at Shearwater is that the best way to confront ugliness is through authentic joy."
And the third panel member, Celeste Adams, an English teacher at Riverview Gardens High School, stressed the need for parents to be the first and perhaps the most influential teacher in their children's lives.
The town hall meeting kicked off American Graduate, an effort by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and its local television and radio stations to try to stimulate conversations and activities that can ease the dropout problem. (Read more about the program here.)
'It's easy to turn your back'
In addition to the panel, the program, which aired on KETC Monday night and will be available on its website, heard from others involved in helping young people stay in school.
One was Jimmie Edwards, the St. Louis juvenile court judge who was recently named "Hero of the Year" by People magazine for his work in founding the Innovative Concept Academy.
He noted that he first encountered many of the students who attend the academy in his courtroom, and he stressed that a rewarding, meaningful educational experience can keep teens on a path away from the justice system.
"We either modify the child today," Edwards said, "or manage that same adult tomorrow."
"It's easy to turn your back," he added. "It's easy to lock them up. What is more difficult for you and I to do with a poor child is to say you can succeed, and you are as bright as any other child."
Teachers in the audience had a variety of responses to the panel and other presentations, some during the show, others in interviews afterward.
Mark Kasen, a teacher at Roosevelt High School, noted that too often, the emphasis of education is not where it should be -- on making sure that what is taught in school is interesting and useful to students.
"Certainly we can influence both the kids and the community, if we are given that opportunity," Kasen said. "Instead, in this country today, what we are focusing on is, can you answer questions on a multiple choice test.
"How do we get you to feel that this is something that is meaningful to you? If we don't do that, the rest of this is a waste of time. The kids don't want to answer meaningless multiple choice questions to make someone in Washington, D.C., or someone in Jefferson City feel good."
Charles Hammon, who teaches at Southwestern Illinois College, added that "if we don't address the emotional trauma of kids, they aren't going to learn."
One of the problems, both men said, is that -- as Kasen put it -- "administrators are afraid of kids."
"They're afraid that if they allow kids to get too much control, they'll go wild. The kids will tell you they won't go wild. Teachers know what to do."
And, Hammon added, town halls like the one Monday night miss the boat by being limited only to teachers.
"How many kids do you see here tonight?" he asked.