Dropouts A Problem

HELLO FOLKS — Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil: Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, h o p e t h all things, endureth all things. Charity never faileth. —Corinthians, Ch. 13.

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I HAD PLANNED for the next few columns another topic. Then it occurred to me that there is a much more important subject that needs to be taken care of before I delve into this other.

The one that I am going to dwell on now is the subject of school dropouts.

In every one of our communities there are young citizens who get discouraged with school, then by quitting it doom themselves, for the most part, to a life of mediocrity and low income.

By quitting at that age they often become discouraged with themselves. They they get a poor outlook on life in general. This affects the community and eventually the nation as a whole.

We cannot afford such an attitude. The very reason we have people on relief rolls and on unemployment is because we haven't developed the attitude of continuous education and re-evaluation.

There is a lot of talk about the Gross National Product and how we can increase it. Here is the only sure way: Get every boy and girl back into school, get them to realize the value of proper attitudes and training. Get them to realize that there are millions of people depending on them to direct the future of society. There are a lot of things each of can do to contribute to solving this problem. Parents are of course most directly concerned and too often we do not give the problem the attention it deserves. As parents we should be constantly on the alert to see that our children are working up to their capacity; that their attitudes toward learning are good and that they respect their teachers and school.

For each one of us we can take an interest in the youth of our community by getting better acquainted with them, by encouraging them to better deeds and let them know that we are expecting great things from them.

We have a lot of senior citizens who could help out with loans to students at low interest rates. The satisfaction derived from such projects would give more real joy than a lot of things the money could be used for. This could give a number of young people the courage to go on to higher learning.

Next week I am going to tell you about three young fellows who could have ended with the ranks of discouraged youth but who by their own efforts practically lifted themselves out of the ruts and are on the way to being real successes.

I am inviting others of you who know of someone in your community, who has picked himself up from mediocrity and gone on to success, to tell about it in this column.