I had a friend create a pipe where he synced his fB to Yahoo, and then Yahoo to Gmail to put his contacts in Gmail... I was contemplating writing a Firefox (or Chrome) extension where you input your Yahoo / Google / Facebook account info. and the extension goes off and does the piping for you. But! this looks awesome, need to go test (by reactivating my fB account...)
I didn't re-read it, but from what I remember, they started an intensive effort to both retain women who started in computing classes as well as understand the reasons why less women start computing and continue.
They had a smaller usegroup they used for their study and show that women drop out thinking that they're not doing as well as men in the same classes when really, they're doing about above average.
I think it's a mistake to view 'starting life' as when you're finished with a milestone (i.e. high school). One should instead think of 'starting life' or, life, as now, regardless of the contextual situation (in high school, in college, not yet married, not yet a successful start-up founder, etc.)
(1) Are you planning on going to university?
a) most top (u.s.) universities look down upon graduating early. They'd prefer to see you really use up all your resources in your area and say, win siemens, start a non-profit, become a lobbyist, start a start-up than graduate early.
b) can you get into a (good) university right now?
(2) Finances. Do you currently rely on your parents' finances? Upon graduating high school, will this change? Would you have to pay for university yourself?
(3) Are you mature enough to be doin' what 18 year olds do when you're 17? I assume you're a dude (most folks here are), and dudes mature slower than girls do. There's a big difference between 17 and 18 (although not really a big difference between 22 and 23, or 40 and 41...)
(4) (small one) Having to explain to all your peers for the next 5 years that yes, you are younger than them and why. Not being able to drink in public legally for a year longer than all your friends.
Honestly, I don't know where you live, but I'd look into Other Enrichment opportunities before graduating early. I went to a state-run public boarding school for science and math in my junior year that was more like college than some colleges are.
Can you just take less classes senior year and work on a start-up? (I presume you're interested in those 'cause you're here...)
Are there good universities (or bad ones) in the area that you could take classes at?
All of those seem like much better options than graduating early and "starting life" earlier. "Starting life" always seems just around the corner when you finish yet another milestone, but I'm slowly becoming more aware of the fact that life starts now (not to get too philosophical).
There are similar schools in the States (Carolina Friends school in Chapel Hill comes to mind), but most of them are very, ridiculously expensive (as much as a private college in the U.S.).
Can you link please to students/parents deciding tracks? I'm very dubious on this actually working, as if it wasn't for direct teacher/administrator intervention in my early education, I wouldn't have been pushed nearly as hard.
I've been able to eat a diet of 80%+ fresh produce on $90/month.
A lot of it involved getting the reduced-almost-bad produce and cooking it day-of, state-level farmer's markets, and dumpster diving, though. Plus, being a college student where every week you can find something free...
I don't really agree with you that it's a marketing problem, but I don't think technology is the answer, either.
Looking at the Digital Bridge Academy's website, it just looks like another way to hold a student's hand.
Community colleges are awesome and serve many much-needed education niches in the U.S. but pushing people through an education that they don't value isn't going to create strong workers, or an educated populace, but simply drive up the minimum education requirements for any job.