Aggies for Change

1. Aggies for Change Presentation by: • Amber Boykin • Chris Mumford • Brandon Murphy • Monica Watlington • Taryn Russ

2. Our Mission • Our mission as a group is to inform students in high school and college of the high percentage of current dropout rates among African Americans. Since African Americans are the least graduating group in America and if one is told this hopefully it will spark hard work and change, which is our goal.

3. High School Dropout Crisis • Approximately, 1.2 million students who enter the ninth grade each year fail to graduate from high school with their peers four years later. • This means 7,000 students are lost each day and more than half of these students are from minority groups.

4. Who’s Graduating in High Schools in the United States?

5. Aggies for Change With Principal Mr. Eric W. Hines Middle College at North Carolina A&T

6. Aggies for Change and Mr. Lewis’s Success 101 Class…

7. Our Trip To The Middle College (Continued…) Mr. Lewis and Amber

8. College Dropout Rate “Without education, there is no hope for our people and without hope, our future is lost.” ~Charles Hamilton Houston

9. Gathering data Age: 18 – 21 22 – 25 26 – 30 30+ Sex: Male / Female 1) Does your environment as a whole affect you academically? Yes / No 2) Are you a first generation college student? Yes / No 3) Do you think activities outside of school (club, dating, working…etc.) are the reason African–Americans have low graduation rates? Yes / No 4) Out of your top 5 priorities where would you rank education? 5) Why do you think African – American males have the highest dropout rate? * Financial opportunities * Peer Pressure * Environment * Other: ________________________________

10. Graduation Rate Change • Increasing the graduation rate and college matriculation of male students in the United States by just 5% could lead to combined savings and revenue of almost $8 billion each year by reducing crime-related costs.

11. Our Stats Yes No

12. Yes No

13. Yes No

16. Pledge • African American college students have the highest dropout rate. • 3 out of 5 African Americans drop out of college. • It is estimated that 40% of college students will leave higher education without getting a degree, with 75% percent of these students leaving within their first two years of college. The members of “Aggies for Change”, ask that you sign the following pledge I,_________________ pledge to achieve satisfactory academic excellence while attending my college/university enabling me to graduate to improve the African American college graduation rate.

17. Conclusion…… • If U.S. high schools and colleges raise the graduation rates of Hispanic, African-American, and Native American students to the levels of white students by 2020, the potential increase in personal income would add more than $310 billion to the U.S. economy.