The California Department of Education made an announcement on Thursday that will have earthshaking impact on the entire state.

For the first time, it acknowledged the massive numbers of County Office of Education dropouts that have been largely invisible to the public. It also acknowledged the existence of the significant numbers of especially tragic dropouts who do not even complete middle school before dropping out.

The County Offices of Education teach juvenile hall detainees, special education and disruptive students who have been expelled from district schools. Surveys by our own organization, California Parents for Educational Choice, have shown that only one California voter in four is aware even of the existence of these schools, an invisibility that has allowed them to lose more than three-quarters of their students to dropping out without the