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Swans and ceiling fans greet patrons at new West Side CTC cafe

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Letter to the Editor: Crops wasted because U.S. lacking farm laborers

<p>This invitation goes &#8211; in particular &#8211; to the area&#8217;s school board members.</p><p>It also applies to anyone in the Greater Wyoming Valley with a passion for curing our community&#8217;s most stubborn social ills, from food insecurity to crime.</p><p>Your presence is requested at next week&#8217;s Wyoming Valley GradNation Community Summit &#8211; a first-of-its-kind event in the region that is intended to result in a blueprint for reducing high school dropout rates in area districts and getting students ready to succeed in life.</p><p>Attendees will hear from Dr. Leonard Sax, a Philadelphia-area family physician and author of books such as &#8220;The Collapse of Parenting.&#8221; They also will be encouraged to participate in breakout sessions, each built around a theme &#8211; such as &#8220;early childhood education&#8221; and &#8220;career readiness&#8221; &#8211; and packed with state and local panelists who are authorities on the topics.</p><p>The summit will be held from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Oct. 28 at Mohegan Sun Pocono in Plains Township. To reserve a spot, go to <a href="http://uwwvsummit.eventbrite.com" target="_blank">http://uwwvsummit.eventbrite.com</a>.</p><p>Organizers at the United Way of Wyoming Valley teamed with America&#8217;s Promise Alliance, the youth-focused foundation created by Gen. Colin Powell, to stage this summit. They aim to draw 325 people &#8211; each a potential partner in the effort to support area students both in and out of school.</p><p>Why focus on education?</p><p>Simply put, if more of our students do better during those early-learning years, the better our society can become in later years. Bill Jones, president and CEO of the area&#8217;s United Way, talks enthusiastically about &#8220;a correlation between graduation rates and the health and welfare of the community.&#8221;</p><p>A student who earns his or her diploma, research shows, is more likely to land a good-paying job and avoid life&#8217;s potential pitfalls: long-term unemployment, incarceration, addiction, poverty. Conversely, a high school dropout has a greater likelihood of needing to rely on welfare-type programs and the social safety net.</p><p>The summit&#8217;s participants will explore all sorts of strategies to boost graduation rates in the area, which vary by school district from well above average to what teachers might call &#8220;needs improvement.&#8221;</p><p>For the 2013-14 school year, GAR High School in Wilkes-Barre recorded a graduation rate of 72.5 percent, according to state Department of Education data. Wyoming Valley West High School that year registered a rate of about 86 percent. The Dallas and Crestwood districts hit 97.8 percent and 96.9 percent, respectively.</p><p>By comparison, the federal government this week announced that the national graduation rate for the 2014-15 school year had risen to an unprecedented 83.2 percent.</p><p>That&#8217;s encouraging news, and with involvement from area school directors and others, the Wyoming Valley can build further momentum around this issue, lifting local rates and improving lives.</p><style>
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<div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta><p><strong>Community Summit</strong></p><p>Information: Call Jennifer Deemer, vice president of community impact for the United Way of Wyoming Valley, at 570-829-6711, ext. 1235. Or send email to jdeemer@unitedwaywb.org.</p></factboxMeta></div>

Our Opinion: United Way inviting Wyoming Valley to focus on raising graduation rates