Dropouts earn less, have a poorer quality of life and create significant costs for the communities and states in which they live, according to the non-profit educational advocacy group The Alliance for Excellent Education.

I asked former West Virginia Governor Bob Wise about that statistic.  Wise, who is now the President of the non-partisan Alliance for Excellent Education, told me the situation is actually worse than the high drop out rate indicates. “A third drop out,” Wise said, “but another third will finish high school…without the skills they need for college or the work place.”

Indiana overall, according to the Alliance for Excellent Education, ranks 29th in the nation in graduation rates.

The nonprofit Alliance for Excellent Education estimates that Connecticut could save $63 million in crime-related costs if the male high school graduation rate was increased by just 5 percent.

"Of the students entering high school in North Carolina, 71 percent are writing below [proficient level], which means they don't have the writing skills they need to succeed," said Bob Wise, president of the Alliance for Excellent Education, a national advocacy group, in a news release.

“While nationally there were some gains from past years, today’s test results in writing are another call to Congress to help high schools,” said Bob Wise, president of the Alliance for Excellent Education. “Of the students entering high school in Rhode Island, 68 percent are writing below grade level, which means they don’t have the writing skills they need to succeed.”

Bob Wise, president of the Alliance for Excellent Education and former governor of West Virginia, said that's not good enough. "Of the students entering high school in Alabama, 76 percent are writing below grade level, which means they don't have the writing skills they need to succeed," he said. "With employers looking at the ability to write well as essential for any job candidate, our high schools need to do more to make sure students are adequately prepared for the demands of the 21st century workplace."

Dropout and truancy affect society at large.  High school dropouts are 3.5 times more likely to commit crime, according to a 2003 report by the Alliance for Excellent Education.

According to the Alliance for Excellent Education, students from the classes of 2006 and 2007 who don’t graduate will cost the nation more than $329 billion in lost wages, taxes, and productivity over their lifetimes." The study was unique in that it used a national benchmark to compare graduation rates. Typically, states report such data applying different methods, making it difficult to compare results across the country.

It's a waste for individual teens to quit school and harmful to society as well. Research done by the Alliance for Excellent Education, a Washington education advocacy group, outlines the economic benefits of keeping more students on track to graduate.