Report: Real High School Grad Rate Hard to Determine

Greater Investment in Census Bureau and Improved Data Collection Needed

PRINCETON, NJ--(MARKET WIRE)--Jan 12, 2009 -- Groundbreaking analysis of the Current Population Survey (CPS) finds that the reported national graduation rates are not accurate, according to a new report from the Educational Testing Service (ETS) Policy Information Center.

The analysis finds lower graduation rates and larger gaps between majority and minority populations than was reported by the Census Bureau and generally lower rates than reported by individual states.

"Chasing the High School Graduation Rate: Getting the Data We Need and Using It Right" examines data indicating that a much greater investment is needed in the national Census Bureau survey showing what percentage of the population, from different age and sub-groups, has graduated from high school. In addition, the report specifies the additional data and quality control needed to enable the National Center for Education Statistics to make more accurate estimates of state graduation rates. The report was written by Paul E. Barton, a Senior Associate for the ETS Policy Information Center.

"Despite the prominence of this issue, we are still unable to produce statistics that would offer accurate data on the percentage of students that graduate from high school each year," says Barton. "We are unlikely to obtain the data needed to address the dropout problem without the necessary funding to accurately measure graduation rates."

Barton recognizes the major efforts being made in many states, led by the National Governor's Association, to develop longitudinal student tracking systems for accountability purposes. But, he says, "We need multiple measures of high school completion, a single one won't do the job."

Job opportunities have become increasingly scarce for young people starting their adulthood without a high school diploma. The proportion of teenagers without a diploma who have jobs has decreased, and the wages of those who do get jobs has fallen. Beyond the hardship to those who leave school without a diploma are the consequences for society -- dropouts pay less in taxes, are more likely to depend on subsidized health care and public assistance, and are more likely to be incarcerated.

According to Barton, the difficulty in determining the graduation rate stems from a number of factors including how the information is gathered by the Census Bureau and how it is reported by the states.

Findings in the report suggest that the following steps be taken to greatly improve graduation rate estimates:

 
--  Schools should report the number of students entering the ninth grade
    at the beginning of the year, not just total enrollment.
--  States, in addition to reporting enrollments by whether students are
    freshmen, sophomores, juniors or seniors, should also report whether they
    are first-, second-, third-, fourth-, fifth- or sixth-year students.
--  States should break down the number of diplomas issued each year by
    the number of years the student was enrolled in a high school and what the
    student has reported about previous enrollment in other high schools.
--  Identify diplomas by type, since more and more types have come into
    play.
--  Assure that the data collected on gender, race and ethnicity are of
    sufficient quality to disaggregate the estimate.

In 2008, the Census Bureau took a major step forward by transferring the collection of graduation rates from the CPS to the American Community Survey (ACS), which includes the prison and military populations and has greater coverage of the population. However, Barton says, "The single question they ask now is insufficient, and we need to have the same reliability for a measure of the graduation rate that we have for the national unemployment rate."

Barton says, "The ultimate goal here is to help more students graduate and to create incentives for schools to accomplish this. To do this we need to be able to accurately measure the rate at regular intervals and apply what we learn in constructive ways that increase graduation rates."

Download the full report, "Chasing the High School Graduation Rate: Getting the Data We Need and Using It Right," for free at www.ets.org/research/pic. Purchase copies for $10.50 (prepaid) by writing to the Policy Information Center, ETS, MS 19-R, Rosedale Road, Princeton, NJ 08541-0001; by calling (609) 734-5949; or by sending an e-mail to pic@ets.org.

About ETS

At nonprofit ETS, we advance quality and equity in education for people worldwide by creating assessments based on rigorous research. ETS serves individuals, educational institutions and government agencies by providing customized solutions for teacher certification, English-language learning, and elementary, secondary and post-secondary education, as well as conducting education research, analysis and policy studies. Founded in 1947, ETS develops, administers and scores more than 50 million tests annually -- including the TOEFL® and TOEIC® tests, the GRE® test and The Praxis Series(TM) assessments -- in more than 180 countries, at over 9,000 locations worldwide. www.ets.org