California spends almost half of its budget to provide education, yet over a fourth of the students dropout before graduation. Almost half of the Latino, African-American, Native-American and Southeast Asian students dropout! This Dropout Crisis threatens the economy and the quality of life in California. Students should have a voice in solving this crisis, not just adults!

The Youth Graduation Empowerment Project (YGEP) challenges students and adult allies to participate in research, civic engagement and service-learning projects to identify improvements in schools and communities. Our goal is action to change schools and communities to increase graduation opportunities for students in our state.

The Youth Graduation Empowerment Project challenges high school and middle school students in California to get involved in one of these activities:

1. Engage in a review of research, survey students to find causes and solutions to the Dropout Crisis and identify the impact of this crisis on your school and community.
2. Organize service-learning projects to create, support or evaluate activities and programs that encourage and support students to graduate.
3. Create videos that show the obstacles to graduation, the programs that support student success or advocate for changes in schools and communities to support this.
4. Identify the changes in schools and communities that will empower more students to graduate and develop and present policy proposals to policymakers and advocate for their approval.

This Call to Action invites thousands of students during this school year to help solve the Dropout Crisis. Student projects and proposals will be networked on the YGEP website (www.ygep.org). Project partners in some areas will support regional summits to engage youth leaders in the project. At a Youth Graduation Empowerment Summit in June, 2009, youth leaders and adult allies will share the results and proposals of this campaign and plan how to expand the project in coming years.

Here are some examples of student activities that would contribute to YGEP:
1. Research the dropout rate for your school/district. Analyze the impact of dropouts in terms of public expenses for truancy, increased health care, incarceration, welfare, etc and the financial benefits of effective interventions.  Share this information with school and community leaders.

2. Research the causes and potential solutions to the dropout crisis, from the perspectives of students.  Design, implement and analyze a survey on what students think causes their peers to drop out and what changes in schools would prevent it.  Interview successful students, at-risk students and dropouts.  Consider what specific changes in schools and communities would support students to graduate.

3. Investigate how media production and networking can provide new opportunities for youth to collaborate on service and civic participation projects.  Students may create videos or a website to identify research or youth-led activities that address the dropout crisis and potential solutions,

4. Evaluate the expert and student-based research on dropout prevention solutions and develop policy recommendations.  Explore the political process in which citizens can advocate for policy changes to improve public institutions.  Plan dynamic presentations to school administrators, school boards, teachers, students, parents and your community policymakers.