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Ellen Belcher is the Dayton Daily News opinion pages editor. She writes about state government, education, the environment, higher education and all things Dayton.
Martin Gottlieb is an editorial writer and columnist for the Dayton Daily News opinion pages. He focuses on the political process itself and does such national issues as war, the economy, taxes and Social Security, as well as a hodge-podge of local and state issues.Home > Blogs > A Matter of Opinion > Archives > 2010 > June > 18
Friday, June 18, 2010
Editorial: Dayton needs to keep med school grads
If Wright State University didn’t look good in a study that ranks medical schools for turning out family practice doctors, that would be a problem.
That was the big justification for creating another medical school in Ohio back in 1974. But some people — including then-Gov. John Gilligan — didn’t think the state needed more public medical schools. They’re immensely expensive, and though students pay through the nose (often graduating with $150,000 in debt), their tuition doesn’t nearly cover the cost of their educations.
At the time of Wright State’s creation, the pitch was that, yes, med schools are expensive, but Wright State would focus on teaching people to be great family doctors, of which there was a shortage.
A new study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine says that Wright State ranks among the top schools in the country on the authors’ “social mission” score. It takes into account three measurements: the number of grads who choose to be family practice doctors; the number who work in poor urban or poor rural areas; and the number who are minorities.
Wright State came in fourth out of 141 schools nationally.
The study has shortcomings, which the authors acknowledge. It is, for instance, based on old data, from 1999-2001. (Researchers used the dated information because they wanted to see where grads really landed after completing their residencies.)
Wright State can take a bow, but it had advantages going into this analysis. It’s not associated with a research hospital, which turn out the most specialists. Of course, a place like Johns Hopkins University, which came in last and is ticked at the results, is going to send more doctors into labs or highly specialized practices.
The country obviously needs both kinds of places — medical schools that encourage specialists and researchers, as well as schools dedicated to preparing students to diagnose minor ailments to life-threatening diseases.
The trouble, of course, is that pulling down major research grants is sexy business and the money can fund important research and treatment. As important, students themselves are increasingly choosing to specialize because specialists typically make twice as much if not more as a family practitioner.
In recent years, though not this year, local family practice residencies have actually gone unfilled. That’s an amazing thing considering how difficult it is to get into medical school.
Wright State has moved away from an almost exclusively primary care focus; it doesn’t want students to think that if they come to the school, they won’t be taken seriously if they want to become cardiologists or brain surgeons. Whether that’s good or bad for the community can be debated.
Many Wright State grads end up staying in the community and state, and Dayton is having a hard time attracting medical specialists, even as it also needs family practice doctors. Which is needed more depends on whom you ask.
But the community’s needs on both fronts are only going to grow. Under the new health care law, tens of thousands more Ohioans are going to have health insurance. They’re all going to need primary care doctors and specialists.
Compounding that situation is the fact that nearly 40 percent of doctors are 55 or older, according to the Center for Workforce Studies of the Association of American Medical Colleges.
Then there’s also the fact that the population is getting older, which means more patients trying to get appointments.
Doctors shortages seem to have always been with us. What’s indisputable is that the demographics of Ohio and federal health care policy are conspiring to ensure that problem doesn’t go away.
Wright State can be one force making sure that the region fares better than other places that aren’t lucky enough to have a medical school.
Permalink | Comments (8) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Education, Ellen Belcher, Health Care
Editorial: Would be dropouts get the help they deserve
If you’re frustrated about school taxes, student test scores or school board politics, here’s a reason to cheer up: the state has seen a big jump in the percentage of kids who are graduating from high school.
Montgomery County, a national model for its dropout-prevention efforts, is helping to boost those numbers.
Ohio ranked 18th among the states with a 74.6 percent graduation rate in an annual report released last week by Education Week magazine’s research arm. (The data is from 2007, the most recent year for which the group had information.)
That’s a solid 5.8 percentage points above the national average and a respectable ranking. But it also leaves plenty of room to improve. (Graduation rates, for this study, were based on the percentage of students who began as ninth-graders, who returned each year and who, ultimately, received a diploma.)
During the past decade, Ohio had the ninth-biggest jump, a gain of 6.3 points over its 1997 graduation rate. Most of the improvement came in the first six years; the rate has actually slipped slightly from its 2003 high of 76.6 percent.
Locally, dropout prevention efforts have been spearheaded by a group of business, government and community leaders who formed the Out of School Youth Task Force in the 1990s.
Mike Carter, interim senior vice president at Sinclair Community College, who headed Montgomery County’s Fast Forward Center for dropouts beginning in 2001, said focus and energy were key to driving the county’s dropout rate down to 11.6 percent in 2007 from 25.6 percent in 2001.
“In 2001, all but two districts in the county had double-digit dropout rates,” he said. “And when we started, only two or three had some kind of dropout program. Now 11 of the 16 school districts have a program.”
Several factors converged to make the difference:
• The state report card. By setting a benchmark for graduation, Ohio forced districts to pay attention to kids who were quitting school. Consider Dayton Public Schools, which a decade ago had a graduation rate that hovered around 50 percent. In 2008, the most recent year available, that number was up to 83 percent. (The state standard requires 90 percent.)
• Better tracking of students. Historically, Dayton did a poor job keeping track of kids who did not show up. Were they dropouts or transfers? Often no one knew. Today’s data systems keep better tabs.
• Giving second chances. In 2005, Dayton schools launched a computer-based “credit recovery” program to help kids make up classes they had failed. With the help of a teacher, they work on computers, complete traditional assignments or both. Dayton has seen 2,000 course completions. Other districts also have credit recovery programs. These efforts keep struggling kids from giving up by letting them catch up quickly — if students are willing to put in extra work before or after school.
• More alternative school options. The explosion of specialty charter school has offered kids who don’t fit in at a traditional school more places to go.
A struggling student can, for instance, learn construction trades at the ISUS Trade and Tech Prep School, prepare for health care or information technology careers at Mound Street Academies or study entrepreneurship at the Dayton Technology Design High School.
Mr. Carter said the Fast Forward Center works to match dropouts with schools where they fit best.
There is still much to be done. The state has to keep pushing schools not just to keep kids on track, but also to make sure graduation doesn’t become easy because schools dumb down courses. Ohio can’t accept a quarter of its students dropping out, but it can’t cheapen its diplomas just so its graduation numbers stack up well.
Permalink | Comments (3) | Post your comment | Categories: City of Dayton, Editorials, Education, Montgomery County, Scott Elliott, Suburban Communities
