ATTENDANCE:
• There are 180 school days per year for four years (180 x 4) for 720 total school days in high school.
• If you miss only one day every two weeks (that's 18 days per year), you've missed 10% of your schooling!
• If you do that for four years, you've missed 72 days (504 class periods), leaving only 648 days.
• That alone is almost an insurmountable roadblock toward graduation.
• If most people in the work force miss more than ten days a year, they'll quite possibly be fired.

ATTENTION & ACTIVE INVOLVEMENT:
• When you think about it, you're in high school for about two years (356 days a year x 2 = 712 days).
• Thus, high school is really only a two-year degree (the other two years are summer vacation, holidays, and weekends).
• You've already lost 10% of your education due to absences.
• Let's say you choose not to pay attention (talking with a friend, staring out the window, doodling, etc.) for only one minute out of every ten (that's five times per period)… There goes another 10%!
• You've just lost another 72 days… 144 days missed out of 720 (that's 20% of your education)… only 576 days left.

BEHAVIOR:
• You're not a “bad” kid, but no one's perfect, right?  Let's say you get suspended five days per year…
• There go 20 days.  You've now missed 23% (164 days) of your education.

PROMPTNESS:
• Let's say you are five minutes late to one class per day.  There go about 11 more days, 175 total missed.

OTHER FACTORS ABOUT SCHOOL IN GENERAL:
• Even though the school tries to avoid them, add five minutes per class of classroom interruptions.
• Add another five minutes for the teacher to take roll, get everyone “settled down” and started.
• Add another five minutes the teacher has to spend disciplining the class or an individual.
• That's 15 minutes per class lost that's not even your fault!  There go 216 school days.  WOW!  391 days down the drain!
• Only 329 days left to earn a quality high school education and diploma.
• Now take away 10 more days per year for CAHSEE, STAR, and finals testing - only 289 days of your high school education.

MOTIVATION:
• Let's say you're sometimes a bit “lazy,” and you only give 50% effort (instead of 100%)
• There go another 144 days lost due to low motivation and effort!
• Only 145 days.  Even if everything goes perfect from here on, your education is worth less than a year.  Gee whiz.

A FEW OTHER FACTORS:
• Students who pick the wrong friends (negative peer influences) may experience significant difficulties… students who don't do their homework will experience significant difficulties… students who use drugs or alcohol give themselves very little chance to succeed in school… students who choose to be defiant, argumentative, resistant, fight, act out, etc., will experience severe setbacks in their education.

CONSIDERATIONS:
• Nationwide, only 7 out of 10 students graduate from high school (therefore, 3 out of 10 don't).
• Those who graduate do so sometimes with only 1-2 years of education and then try to compete worldwide for jobs.

CONCLUSIONS:
• Your education is about you, but not completely about you… it is also about society's survival.
• Society is only as strong as the next generation.
• Every second of your life is precious, important, and valuable.
• What will be your choices regarding your education, your future, your dreams, and your society?
• You only have one chance at high school… GO FOR THE GOLD!  MAKE IT COUNT!

“A student gets out of education what she or he puts into it.”

“Education works when a professional educator and a student work cooperatively toward an educational goal…
… everything else doesn't work!”
 

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Published Thursday, September 15th, 2005 as part of the September Monthly KOG.

KOG Resources © 2005-12.  KASP.  Kern County, California, USA.  Some rights reserved.

www.kernschoolpsych.org/scaretactic.htm