Steps to stem the dropout rate

Re “High school dropout rate climbs to 34.9%,” May 13

The news that the Los Angeles County high school dropout rate is over 1 in 3 means that life will be bleak for these dropouts with few skills, and bleak for the other citizens who will have to support most of them, in our prisons or social net.

This is not necessarily a school system problem -- though a little more creativity in approaches might be helpful -- but it is a failure of parents in leading their children to adaptive behavior toward success.

It seems that a blue-ribbon committee needs to outline the practical, achievable steps that can be taken by schools, parents and other institutions to produce more successful behavior.

Roy Krausen

Laytonville, Calif.

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It’s sad to learn that the dropout rate increased in the LAUSD by 3 percentage points over the previous year, instead of decreasing.

There are many complex issues involved in such a drop, but one very important issue for non-English speakers is the ability to learn the language better and much more quickly. The schools owe it to the youth and to their instructors to try drastically innovative texts and methods on the entry-level courses for English as a second language.

With success in the language, other successes will blossom.

John Lihani

Pasadena