Well, according to a new study, we're leaving behind 7,000 children every school day in this country. The 1.2 million students, who should be graduating high school this spring most likely won't be.
Translation, 7,000 kids a day in the United States are leaving school. That's according to an alarming study sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on the state of education in this country. Last year Bill Gates called American high schools obsolete. Based on these numbers, he might have been on to something.
The big cities are the worst; 14 urban districts places like Detroit, Los Angeles, Miami, Denver, Cleveland, Dallas, Milwaukee. They have an on-time graduation right of less than 50 percent.
In New York City the on-time graduation rate is just 38.9 percent. In Baltimore, Maryland, it's 38.5 percent. And in Detroit, Michigan the on-time graduation rate of high school students, 21.7 percent. That's disgraceful.
The nation's overall graduation rate is about 70 percent, so the question is this -- what does it mean when 7,000 students are dropping out of school every day?