Recently Alberta’s Minister of Education, David Hancock, encouraged business to hire only students who have completed a high school diploma. This was in response to recent reports that Alberta has one of the highest dropout rates in the country. I think David Hancock is being very short-sighted and narrow-minded.

He’s assuming that all the students that drop out are doing so just to get a high paying job in the oil field. I’m wondering if he stopped to consider that some students are dropping out because they need to do things like pay rent, buy groceries, support their family.

If my former employers had agreed to not hire people without a high school diploma I wouldn’t be where I am today. I wouldn’t be heavily invested in the world of education. I work at a post secondary institution and sit on the board of a provincial organization targeted at education. I would still be scraping by and I never would have gone to college and I may never have ended up getting my high school diploma.

When it comes down to the choice between having a home and eating or getting your high school education, what does Mr. Hancock think people are going to do?

I know that the Minister’s comments were directed more towards the individuals that were hiring the students that were just looking to make some fast cash in a very lucrative industry, but perhaps he needs to think about the people that would be really harmed, that would truly suffer, if business were to actually listen to him.