I want to live in a community where you need to have at least a high school diploma to be able get a full time job. We need to move forward and not stay on the same place and if more students stay in school and continue their studies after school we will move to a better tomorrow.

After 16 some students start thinking of school as a juvenile detention center but they shouldn’t because, schools are not only for learning Math, Science, or English they are also a place where students social skills. As my fellow class mate Mauricio Morales from East Valley High stated, if students drop out of school the crime rate will go up because as police statistics show that the crime rate goes up after students are released from school to the time their parents get home and with more minors out of school grounds they will get into problems and create mischief. If the “drop outs” get the signature from their parents allowing them to drop out then that will influence other kids to nag their parents until the parent has to sign the permission sheet letting him/her to drop out.

As The Home School Court Report read, compulsory education first started in Massachusetts in 1852. In the next 15 years no one followed in Massachusetts steps until 1867 when a lot of states began accepting the compulsory education law. By 1918 all states had enacted the law. In 1887 only Washington had required that you need to be 18 to drop out of school. Now only 14 states have that requirement.

If students stay in school they will be safe, out of trouble, and maybe even learn something. What more schools should do is let students that have good behavior and relatively good grades out early on special occasions and that might encourage the students who don’t want to be at school to do their work and behave good to leave school early.

Should students be able to drop out at 18 and not at an earlier age? Parents shouldn’t be able to sign a peace of paper giving teenagers authority to drop out of school and do what they want. Crime, drugs, and sex will most likely influence students dropping out of school, which is not necessarily a good thing. We don’t want that to happen do we?

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