Education Law

Did NBC News get it right on graduation rates?

Tuesday night BoardBuzz noticed a statement on NBC Nightly News that the U.S. high school graduation rate ranked 19th in the world, just ahead of Mexico. Just ahead of Mexico? BoardBuzz wasn?t sure about that, so we did a little investigating.

Turns out NBC News was close on where the U.S. ranked, but not so much on being just ahead of Mexico. According to the latest numbers from the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), the U.S. graduation rate actually ranked 18th out of 24 countries, but Mexico?s graduation rate of just 42 percent lagged well behind the U.S. rate of 77 percent. Not exactly "just ahead of Mexico." However, the U.S. does have a lot of ground to cover to catch up with the likes of Finland, Korea, Japan, and Norway, which graduate over 90 percent of their students.

Luckily educators, school board members, and other policy makers from around the country are working hard to improve the graduation rates in their local schools. This is no easy task, of course, but they can find help by checking out the Center for Public Education to find out what has been working to increase the number of high school graduates and what has not. The Center?s most recent report, "School Organization: Structuring Schools so Students Succeed," provides valuable information on how organizing schools has been effective in reducing dropouts and increasing graduation rates. BoardBuzz highly recommends it to find out how schools are best organized to help students.

While you?re visiting the Center, check out its report on Dropout Prevention to learn more about what is proven to work in keeping kids in school.

Full post as published by BoardBuzz: NSBA's Daily Weblog on September 10, 2008 (boomark / email).