Texas Posts Top High School Graduation Rates, But Why?

Morgan Smith:

While skeptics say reporting requirements for state graduation rates contain too many loopholes, other education policy experts say Texas deserves credit for implementing innovative programs to keep students in school.

With witnesses in a school finance trial testifying daily on the challenges facing public education in the state, and with a chorus of state leaders citing the failings of traditional public schools in calling for reform, some may be surprised to hear that by one measure, Texas schools appear to be doing quite well.

Preliminary data released by the U.S. Department of Education this week shows that Texas -- along with five other states -- ranks fourth in the nation for its four-year high school graduation rates. With an overall rate of 86 percent in the 2010-11 school year, the state follows Iowa, with 88 percent, and Wisconsin and Vermont, both at 87 percent.

Though the statewide average has climbed steadily in the past five years, that has not always been the case. The last time the Texas Supreme Court ruled on the state's school finance system, in 2005, it warned of a "severe dropout problem," calling the lagging graduation rates of blacks and Hispanics "especially troublesome."'

Posted by Jim Zellmer at December 5, 2012 4:12 AM
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