n high school and college. Few, however, have acquired the ability to express themselves in that language. But if a person develops an interest in travelling to the particular country where the foreign language is spoken, he or she will acquire the language, based on the interest. As educator and philosopher John Dewey put it, "The interest is always the sign of some power below; the important thing is to discover this power." The performing arts have been one of the areas in which a wide variety of students have expressed interest and in which they can achieve success.
Involvement in the performing arts can make a difference in a student's decision to stay in school or to drop out. Students who have a weak connection to the school as an institution are more likely to feel that academic commitment is irrelevant to their lives. This feeling of powerlessness is usually more apparent on large, urban campuses: "The impersonality of the large urban high school is an example of a nonacademic dimension to life in schools that is frequently described as leading to withdrawal." The decision to drop out of school has been defined as a process based on a complex array of factors, including language barriers, economic status, responsibilities outside school, influences within the school, and societal pressures. Some students are at-risk for many of these factors. Part of the solution to the alienation that students experience in school is their participation as members of a performing arts community within the school. As Dr. Ernest Boyer, President of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, puts it, "The arts can be powerfully motivating for young people who are socially alienated . . . I'm convinced that the arts have a very special role to play in giving teenagers of this nation a larger sense of purpose."
In a practical sense, every student should acquire the skills and knowledge that equip for productive...