Dive Brief:
- Overall in New York state, the rate of high school graduates has increased, with NYC's own rate notably rising over 70% for the very first time.
- Despite the general gains, a racial achievement gap exists, with 88% of white students graduating on time as opposed to 65% of black and Hispanic students.
- A significant achievement gap also exists for students with disabilities, half of whom are able to graduate from high school on time.
Dive Insight:
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has said that the city's goal is to reach an 80% high school graduation rate within the next decade, a target that would bring it up to par with the national graduation rate's current peak of 82%.
Yet that percentage has been called into question. An NPR investigation from last June concluded that a variety of tactics in several states actually worked against the cited numbers, including mislabeling students, removing students from school recordkeeping, cheating, and simplifying graduation requirements to make them easier to pass.
And in cities like Chicago, districts have been caught inflating graduation rates. Chicago Public Schools admitted to a graduation rate of 66% in October, lower than the 69% it first reported.
On a national level, students of color also still aren't graduating from college at the same rate as their white peers. A study from the Education Trust found that among the 255 schools that improved graduation rates, “more than 20% didn’t make any progress with underrepresented students at all, and more than half that did still didn't close existing gaps.”