Updated with new research and recent case studies - discover the nine key principles that empower students and their communities.Since 1977, Communities In Schools (CIS) has reached more than one million students and their families each year, surrounding them with a community of support and empowering them to stay in school and achieve in life. In The Last Dropout, CIS founder Bill Milliken offers nine key principles that Communities In Schools has tested over four decades. Interwoven are his real-world life stories, a journey that began in the turbulent 1960s as a youth worker and evolved into a handful of ground-breaking 'Street Academies' that became the CIS movement with a national network of hundreds of local affiliates. Milliken's guiding philosophy has been 'It is relationships, not programmes, that change children,' and it is a principle that has served as a beacon in the movement for educational equity and success.