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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Graduation rates found disappointing

Ledyard King Gannett News Service

WASHINGTON – Three out of 10 ninth-graders don’t graduate from high school on time, and that is hampering national efforts to retain America’s competitive edge, according to a new report.

Minorities, boys and low-income students make up a disproportionately high number of the estimated 1.2 million students that enter public school as freshmen but stumble somewhere along the way, according to the Diplomas Count report from Education Week, a trade newspaper. The report, based on 2002-03 school-year data, found that ninth-graders are the likeliest to falter.

The Education Week findings come as states, prodded by the federal No Child Left Behind Act, have begun raising graduation standards, and instituted high school exit exams. The report challenges states on how they report graduation rates, saying parents and taxpayers have gotten a rosier picture than reality suggests.

Among the findings of the study, supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation:

•Girls (73 percent) were more likelier to finish on time than boys (65 percent).

•Students from the richest areas (79 percent) were likelier to finish on time than those from the poorest (60 percent).

•Teenagers from majority white school systems (76 percent) were likelier to finish on time than those where racial minorities made up most of the student body (58 percent).

•New Jersey leads the nation with an 84.5 percent graduation rate, while South Carolina is last at 52.5 percent.

The results indicate a problem that government has not fully confronted, said Christopher Swanson, director of the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center, which is the research arm of Education Week.

“When 30 percent of our ninth-graders fail to finish high school with a diploma, we are dealing with a crisis that has frightening implications for our country’s future,” he said.

The report did not count students who obtained a General Equivalency Diploma and did not track students who transferred to another school district during their high school career.