Money invested in preventing students from dropping out of school is well spent, according to a five-year evaluation of Communities in Schools, a dropout-prevention program active in nearly 3,000 schools.
The report by Economic Modeling Specialists Inc. of Moscow, Idaho, focuses on the 113 CIS affiliates that serve high schools. The authors calculated the cost of the program and the added expenses of students choosing school over work and weighed them against the economic benefits of the higher earnings, lower crime rates, and better health associated with more education.
They found that every dollar of investment in the program yields $11.60 in economic benefit.
