Disposable Youth has the power to change America. Seventy percent of the 2.4 million prisoners in America today are high school dropouts. Half of all African American and Hispanic urban high school students drop out. Forty percent of all urban high school students drop out. This continuum of dropping out of high school and into crime and then prison does not have to persist. Disposable Youth offers a new way of organizing American high schools. This educational innovation is called a Career Academy, which graduates 90 percent of their students. By implementing Career Academies on a national scale, the number of prisoners incarcerated in America could be reduced by one million. The implications of connecting school dropout rates to criminal behavior and incarceration is critical to the future of America.
