Drop Out, Join In
Professor Recruits Young People Without Diplomas to Help Study Peers
by Karen Shih ’09 | illustration by Kelsey Marotta ’14 Edwin Alamo spent more time in prison than in school. Two decades ago, facing multiple suspensions and a system that didn’t seem to care whether he showed up for class, he dropped out of ninth grade in Lawrence, Mass. A year later, he was convicted of a gang-related attempted murder, for which he served 12 years in prison. “I was into the streets and gang activity,” says Alamo. “I just wanted to be part of the crowd and who I felt good with.” His lack of education isn’t unusual in the post-industrial city of 75,000: Half of its students never graduate from high school. Nationally, the U.S. Census Bureau reports that more than 3 million people ages 18 to 24 don’t have a high school diploma or GED. Their prospects are grim: Less than 40 percent are employed, estimates the Bureau of Labor Statistics, with most holding only low-wage, part-time or temporary jobs. When education Assistant Professor Tara Brown approached Alamo at a construction training program in 2012 to study this issue, he saw it as an opportunity to help a new generation in his majority-Latino town—which includes his own relatives—understand and avoid his mistakes. She recruited two other high school dropouts, Jesus Santos and Newlyn De La Rosa, and together they conducted about 40 interviews and collected about 220 surveys from others like them, aged 18 to 24. “It’s really challenging to go into a community where I’m an outsider and I have no trust or credibility,” Brown says. “They knew the lay of the land, the rhythms and other young people.”
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