A newly released national study underscores Idaho’s low graduation rates at its alternative and virtual high schools, writes Kevin Richert of Idaho Education News. GradNation, a Washington, D.C.-based coalition that is pushing for a 90 percent national graduation rate by 2020, found that slightly more than a fifth of the state’s high schools had a low graduation rate, which is defined as 67 percent or less. Only 11 other states topped that 20 percent threshold.

The 35 low-graduation rate high schools include 22 alternative high schools and 10 virtual schools. Only two conventional high schools and one brick-and-mortal charter school fell below that 67 percent graduation rate. In 2014, 4,820 Idaho students failed to graduate, with more than half of those students attending one of the 35 schools with a low graduation rate. Richert’s full report is online here.