I’ve been thinking about it for the last day and I’m not sure what to make of this status report on the “I Have a Dream” project. It’s been a while but you may recall that in 1988 two wealthy businessmen set up a foundation to implement the pact they’d made with 59 fifth grade students in Prince George’s County: complete high school and they’d pay their college tuition.
I found the report confusingly written and prolix but worth reading nonetheless. The “database” presenting the results is here. In summary 44 (87%) graduated from high school, 12 (20%) graduated from trade school, 11 (19%) graduated from college.
Can any conclusions be drawn from these results? Despite the incentives and the considerable amount of attention, assistance, and enrichment the kids had received other factors or, as one of the students put it, “life” proved more important in determining the outcomes for the 59.
If any conclusion can be drawn I think it is that one size does not fit all, that higher education is not for everyone, and that we need a country that offers a range of possibilities for leading a decent life rather than a single professionally-oriented path from high school to college to post-graduate education. If that’s the only path for anything other than suicide, prison, or a lifetime working at minimum wage, what will become of the other 90% of the people?
Compare it with a cohort from that same economic group w/o aid.
OT- Interesting piece on uncertainty.
http://www.econbrowser.com/archives/2011/12/regulatory_unce.html
Steve
Essentially, a high school graduation rate of 87% compared with a high school graduation rate of 50%. But I don’t think that’s the message.
Imagine that there’s a treatment that can prolong life for three days at a cost of $100,000 a day. That’s just a curiosity. You can’t make a practical policy out of it.
Same here. It was an improvement but not enough of an improvement to generalize into a policy.
What are you, nuts? Have you read nothing you’ve written about health care? Of course we can and would make such a treatment policy.