Report: Texas high school graduation rates rising
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Texas' graduation rate for high school students increased 1.9 percent since 2002 to just below the national average, according to a new report by a coalition of education groups.
The report found that high school graduation rates rose from 73.5 percent to 75.4 percent between 2002 and 2009— and pulled almost even with the 2009 average nationwide of 75.5 percent.
The national graduation rate, though, increased faster than the state's, climbing 2.9 percent over the same 7-year period. The biggest gains nationwide came in Tennessee, where rates jumped 17.8 percent, and New York, which increased 13 percent, between 2002 and 2009.
The report did not provide a state-by-state ranking, but comparing results showed that Texas and Colorado are tied for 28th, just behind Oregon and just ahead of Michigan, Rhode Island and Hawaii. Wisconsin led the nation with a graduation rate of 90.7, while Nevada was last with 56.3 percent.
Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/article/Report-Texas-high-school-graduation-rates-rising-3416975.php#ixzz1pXbqdH8A
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Although tied at 28th place is not exactly high end work, at least we are passing and making some improvement.
I would still like to see a breakdown by region and by school district. I know that there are areas where the differences are very large. This is why equal financial footing in the school districts is so important.
On a related note - Senator Leticia Van de Putte wrote an OpEd for the San Antonio Express on shortchanging our kid's future.
Shortchanging education expensive in long run
(snip)
Legislators must realize that we weren't elected just to be bookkeepers. We were elected to set priorities, defend them and find a way to fund them, just like all Texans do with their families. We start with the essentials — the mortgage, the car, the bills — and, if need be, cut out the luxuries.
Education is not a luxury. Public schools are valued by people of both political parties, as well as independents, and they don't want to drain resources from it with schemes such as vouchers.
But lawmakers slashed $5.4 billion from public education. Many Texans were shocked when they realized what was to happen to their children and the dedicated people paid to educate them. Many more are about to catch on, as additional teachers and support staff get pink slips and kids get crammed into the classrooms of those who remain.
Schools districts are employing approximately 25,000 fewer full-time-equivalent employees than at this time last year, including about 11,000 fewer teachers, numbers made worse by increasing enrollments. Since the budget cuts, requests for waivers to class-size limits came from 278 districts for 7,405 classrooms.
And this comes at a time when the Legislature also mandated a raising of standards via the new State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, or STAAR, end-of-course examinations.
repukes are going to drive those graduation rate numbers down. They are so short sighted and only think about education in terms of money.
