• Among students currently enrolled in high school, less than 1 in 10 find high school to be "very hard" while more than 1 in 3 find school to be "easy."
  
  
• Over half of the students said that they would work harder if their classes were more interesting and relevant.
  
  
• Of the students who have left school or are considering dropping out of high school, the majority said that the following reasons would make them more likely to stay in school:
  
  
  • Personal attention and assistance with academics
    
    
  • If I knew I'd earn more money after graduating
    
    
  • If I knew I'd get a better job after graduation
    

ONLINE HEARINGS
One positive (and perhaps unintended) result of the pervasiveness of online technology in the civic and educational arenas has been the dramatic and disproportionate rate of participation of young people. For example, the New York City Council formed a special commission of experts and stakeholders to formulate recommendations on how to best use the anticipated court-mandated $5.6 billion intended to achieve adequacy in New York City public schools. However, the majority of the initial 8 public hearings held by the commission were sparsely attended. Andrew Rasiej, chairman of Making Opportunities for Upgrading Schools and Education (M.O.U.S.E.), suggested to the commission's chairman, Anthony Alvarado, that an online forum to post comments could allow for greater participation.

The "Your Voice, Your Schools" online hearings were held for two weeks in February 2005. Almost 200 citizens took part in the forums. An additional 165 New Yorkers e-mailed the moderator, Barry Joseph of Global Kids, who told Federal Computer Week , "This is an opportunity that people really took advantage of because they knew that elected officials were listening." And, according to Joseph, the comments featured detailed and informative ideas: "I'm talking about 365 very grounded, substantive posts that people spent a considerable amount of time not only writing but often giving footnotes at the bottom about what books and articles they're referring to back it up." According to the Commission's most recent report, beginning in 2004 the Commission held 7 hearings at City Hall and local universities and held a town hall meeting in each of the five boroughs to hear testimony on issues affecting the public school system.

To join the discussion groups, a user simply registered his or her name, e-mail address, age, gender, ethnicity, and brief biographical information. In addition to the work of the moderator, two representatives from Global Kids monitored the traffic and posts in each discussion group, recommending to participants which groups might best match their interests. The commission hoped that the online forums would focus on six subjects:

• class and school size
• teacher retention, recruitment, and quality
• after-school programs
• pre-Kindergarten programs
• facilities and technology
• school accountability