Several media outlets are covering new data from the National Center for Education Statistics regarding rising US graduation rates. Reports range from the national to state level, and are generally positive in tone. Reuters (1/22, Kelleher) reports that according to a new ED report, US high school graduation rates have risen to a 40-year peak of 78.2% suggesting that rising graduation rates among Hispanic students are driving the trend. The piece notes that Education Secretary Arne Duncan praised the results, particularly the 10% surge in Hispanic graduation rates. However, he called US dropout rates "unsustainably high for a knowledge-based economy."
The Huffington Post (1/22, Resmovits) reports that the NCES report shows that more "high school students than ever are graduating on time," noting that "the percentage of students who graduated from high school within four years of starting ninth grade in the 2006-2007 school year hit a record high, according to the report." The Post quotes NCES Director Jack Buckley saying, "What we see is an increase." The Post adds, "NCES has put out this report since 2005, but Buckley's team has made estimates back into the 1970s." According to Buckley, the last time statistics indicate such a high graduation rate was in 1968.
NBC Nightly News (1/22, story 7, 0:25, Williams) reported, "Federal officials say the high school graduation rate is going up. The nationwide average climb to just above 78% in 2010, the last year with numbers available. There's a lot of work yet to be done. But it's the highest it's been since 1974. The main reason, they say, fewer jobs out there to tempt young people to leave high school."
NBC Today Show (1/22, 9:09 a.m. EST) broadcast, "The national high school graduation rate is now the highest it has been since 1976, but the US Education Department says it takes more than the standard four years for more than 20% of students to finish and get their diplomas. Officials credit the rise in the graduation rate to the stiff competition for limited jobs."
The Christian Science Monitor (1/22, Terry) reports that the rise is "motivated in part by grim economic conditions and the need to be competitive in a crowded job market." The NCES reported Tuesday that over "3.1 million high school students received their diplomas in spring 2010, with 78.2 percent finishing in four years." The Monitor quotes Education Secretary Arne Duncan saying, "If you drop out of high school, how many good jobs are there out there for you? None. When I grew up on the South Side of Chicago, it wasn't great, but I had lots of friends who dropped out, and they could go work in the stockyards or steel mills, and they could buy a home, support a family, do OK."
The National Journal (1/23, Brannon, Subscription Publication) and FOX News Latino (1/22, Garcia) also cover this story. More Latinos are graduating from high school than they were nearly a decade ago, according to a new study by the US Department of Education.
Several media outlets run state-level reports detailing individual states' performance. Examples include an NPR (1/22, O'Connor) "StateImpact" piece out of Florida, WACH-TV Columbia, SC (1/23, Malone), the Charleston (WV) Gazette (1/23, Mays), the Maine Public Broadcasting Network (1/23), VTDigger (1/22, Freese), KOLR-TV Springfield, MO (1/23), an AP (1/23) article out of New Mexico, an AP (1/23), article out of Pennsylvania, Albuquerque (NM) Business First (1/23, Gerew), Minnesota Public Radio (1/22, Post), WHYY-FM Philadelphia (1/23), the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (1/23, Downey) "Get Schooled" blog, WPRI-TV Providence, RI (1/23, Nesi), the Wilmington (DE) News Journal (1/23), the Phoenix Business Journal (1/23, Subscription Publication), KCIT-TV Amarillo, TX (1/23), KXAS-TV Dallas (1/23), an AP (1/22), article out of Texas, the Las Vegas Sun (1/22), an AP (1/23) article out of West Virginia, an AP (1/23, Rathke)article out of Vermont, and Minnesota Public Radio (1/22, Post).
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