Debate Nirvana

A study conducted in 2002 called “The Correlation Between Attendance and Achievement at Garey High School”; Also a study by the University of Connecticut in 2009 found a 75% correlation between attendance and GPA meaning that those students who have low numbers of absences tend to have a higher G.P.A. Also a University of Pennsylvania study on Philadelphia School District from 1994 through 2001 found similar results. 

In schools that had strong academic requirements, athletic directors reported students adjusted to the requirements once they were set in place. In a study by the U.S. Sports Academy, one athletic director in New Mexico stated that kids know what the minimum grade point average is to be eligible so they will do what is required. In fact, he even thought that they could raise the grade point to 2.5 and the student-athletes would adjust in a matter of time. The Los Angles Unified School District instituted a rule that stated, "To be eligible for participation in extracurricular activities students must maintain a C average in four subjects and have no failures" (Eitzen & Sage, 1989). In 1984 the state of Texas introduced a "No Pass No Play" rule that stated that athletes could not have any failing grades if they were to participate in a sporting activity (Richards, 1987). Initially, a large group of students became ineligible to compete and there was strong opposition from coaches and parents. But in a matter of two years, in both of these instances, the percentage of students who were declared ineligible was the same as before the rule was enacted. 

According to the National Association of Colleges and Employers' "Job Outlook 2005" survey, 70 percent of hiring managers do report screening applicants based on their GPA.  And minimum GPA’s are not just used for employment but to get into college, to receive grants and financial aid, and to participate in extracurricular activities as well.  The majority of states even have a minimum GPA requirement for teens to get their driver’s licenses. Twenty-seven states have laws in place that allow a student's driving privileges to be suspended due to poor behavior at school. Five of the 27 specify that students must uphold satisfactory progress academically.

 In the Handbook of Marriage and Family, the authors find the “Longer hours of work for teens are associated with higher rates of tardiness, more conduct problems and lower grades.  Employed students when compared to nonemployed students, had lower grades, spent less time on homework and had lower educational expectations and expressed more disengagement from school.  Employed 10 and 11th grade students who worked long hours experienced an increased use of alcohol.  There are psychosocial costs associated with teenage employment because it interferes with identity formation, peer groups and academic success.

In the book Juvenile Delinquency by Larry Siegel, he found that “while gainful employment sounds like a healthy choice, research shows that adolescent work experience may actually increase delinquency.  Kids who get jobs may be looking for an easy opportunity to acquire cash to buy drugs and alcohol; after-school jobs may attract teens who are more impulsive than ambitious. Some aspects of the work experience, such as autonomy, increased social status among peer and increased income may neutralize the positive effects of working.

Every year, close to 1/3 of 18 year olds do not finish high school. The dropout rates for minority students, students from low-income families, and disabled students are even higher. A high school diploma earns a person on average $8,400 more a year or more than $420,000 over a lifetime.   But this is not just a problem affecting the individual dropout.  It is a community-wide problem that affects everyone.  A study by the Economics Center for Education and Research in Ohio found that high school graduates contribute more to a state's economy and require less state assistance than high school dropouts. High school dropouts commit about 75 percent of crimes in the United States and are much more likely to be on public assistance than those who complete high school. The cost to the public for these crime and welfare benefits is close to $200 billion annually. Because dropouts earn only about 60 percent of what high school graduates earn and only about 40 percent of the income of college degree holders – resulting in about $50 billon dollars in lost state and federal tax revenues each year. Dropouts are much more likely to have health problems than non-dropouts. A 1% increase in high school completion rate would save the United States $1.4 billion annually in health care costs.

 A study by the Employment Policies Institute states that the summer teen employment outlook looks bleak. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, only 32.6 percent of teenagers ages 16 to 19 were employed in 2008. It was a historic low, down from 45.2 percent in 2000. This year, all of the economic indicators point to the teen unemployment rate rising even further. And that means more bad news for youths looking for work because now they will be competing with adults for the same jobs. As New York Times columnist Bob Herbert noted: “Good jobs are hard to find for most categories of workers... One of the results has been that older men and women have been taking and holding onto jobs that in prior eras would have gone to young people.”

A 2006 survey by Collegegrad.com found that only 6% of employers thought that a job candidates’ GPA was the most important piece of information about an individual. The survey found that the interview and work experience were ranked higher than GPA when determining an applicant's aptitude.  Indeed, an employer has many other more equitable and telling ways to judge a teen job applicant, such as recommendations, sample work product, grades in directly-related classes, challenging classes taken, other work experience, relevant extra-curriculars, and interview performance.

The Nation’s Report Card 2005 Transcript Study surveyed U.S. high schools and found in 2005 the average GPA of Asians was 3.16, whites, 3.05, Hispanics, 2.82 and African Americans, 2.69.  Thus, an employer asking for GPA information from job applicants opens the door to discriminating against lower GPA candidates, even if they meet the 2.0 threshold, if we are going to be basing employment on GPA. And since African Americans and Hispanics have lower average GPAs, this could lead to racial discrimination in employment practices.

This could result in higher unemployment among minorities, who already suffer higher unemployment rates than whites.  According to the US Department of Labor, unemployment rates for African American high school students is 47% and Hispanics 40%, compared with Caucasians at 23%.