What gets you “fired up”? Maybe it’s watching your favorite football team play in a bowl game. Maybe it’s cooking your favorite dish or maybe it’s reciting poetry. I used to know exactly what got me fired up; at least two of the above were on my list. A graduate from The University of Texas, I certainly got fired up when the Longhorns played in the national championship (let’s not talk about it).

But it wasn’t until I moved to Columbia a couple of months ago that I truly began to realize what gets me fired up. I decided to do a year of service with City Year as a senior corps member and have since begun to understand the magnitude of our nation’s high school dropout crisis and the enormous challenge we face in solving it. I think most people in Columbia have heard of City Year. After all, we’ve been part of the Columbia community since 1993. If you haven’t heard of City Year, then perhaps you’ve driven down Main Street and seen our recently painted logo on the road in front of City Hall.

City Year is an international non–profit that brings together young people, ages 17–24, from all backgrounds for a year of full–time national service. Many people in the community remember City Year as young people in red jackets who do beautification projects, paint murals, and work on homelessness and health issues. For the last three years, the entire City Year network and City Year Columbia have become laser focused on our nation’s dropout crisis. This year, 25 corps members from all over the country and from all different Universities are serving in four Richland One Schools: Hyatt Park Elementary, Sandel Elementary, Gibbes Middle School, and C.A. Johnson High Schools. We are with the students from the time they arrive to school to the time they leave. We tutor, mentor, serve as role models, and work to make the environment fun and exciting for learning. We are making an impact in these schools by keeping kids in school and on track to graduation.

Recent studies by Johns Hopkins University have found that students who exhibit at least one of three off–track indicators (ABC’s): low Attendance, poor Behavior, and Course failure in math and English as early as sixth grade, have less than a 25 percent chance of graduating. 1,700 schools in the U.S. produce 55% of the nation’s dropouts and 75% of the minority dropouts. Five of the six high schools in Columbia are part of these 1,700 schools, and the economic impact is staggering. High school dropouts are three times more likely than college graduates to be unemployed and eight times more likely to be incarcerated than high school graduates. The more than 12 million students projected to dropout over the next decade will cost the nation an estimated three trillion dollars.

Our dropout rates are truly a crisis. China recently surpassed Japan to become the world’s second largest economy, and it’s estimated that the U.S. will fall to number two within the next 20 years. This should send warning signs to anyone interested in keeping this country strong, competitive, and innovative. The good news? We live in a great country with even greater potential. This is a man/woman–made problem and therefore, in my opinion, can be solved by people. There are ordinary people all across this country who do extraordinary things everyday. Some are teachers, policy–makers, parents, and volunteers who face the challenge that is our education system. I get to work with some of them everyday.

So what gets you fired up? Every 26 seconds a student gives up on school in America. That’s what gets me out of bed. If you’re not already involved, get involved. Thank a teacher, volunteer your time with the Palmetto Mentoring Network, donate school supplies, voice your concern to your elected officials or find a nonprofit to get involved with. If we truly come together as a community, we can fix this. After all, anything is possible; Even this Longhorn rooting for the Gamecocks come September.

Gordon Rooney

Gordon Rooney is a graduate of The University of Texas at Austin where he studied government and history. He’s currently serving with City Year as a Senior Corps member and the External Affairs Project leader.