Data a factor in low graduation rates

COUNCIL BLUFFS — The graduation rates in both the Council Bluffs and the Lewis Central school districts dropped for 2009, but part of the reason may be the way the numbers are calculated.

Iowa’s overall graduation rate dropped from 88.7 percent in 2008 to 87.2 percent in 2009.

The Lewis Central graduation rate for the class of 2009 was 83.94 percent, lower than the 2008 graduation rate of 85.24 percent.

The Council Bluffs district’s official 2009 graduation rate was 73.06 percent, compared to 74.56 percent in 2008.

The change had no effect at St. Albert Catholic High School, marketing director Jenny Van Soelen said. In both 2008 and 2009, St. Albert had a 100 percent graduation rate.

“In addition, 96 percent of our graduates go on to college. These numbers have remained consistent for at least the past five years,” Van Soelen said.

For the Council Bluffs and Lewis Central districts, the decline could be attributed to better data, Lewis Central school improvement specialist Dave Black said. The State of Iowa has changed the way it calculates graduation rates, “and we’re more confident in the numbers now.”

Council Bluffs Superintendent Martha Bruckner said the new numbers “are accurate for the number of kids who graduate in four years.” However, the numbers in previous years included students who took more than four years to graduate, “sometimes five or six years.”

Students who stay in high school longer than four years are not counted in the current graduation rates, even if they get diplomas, Black said.

The graduation calculation counts students who enter school as freshmen and tracks them to find out if they graduated four years later, Bruckner said.

“It’s a valid number to track, but if it takes more than four years for a student to graduate, they will still be our graduates,” Bruckner said.

Black concurred, asking, “What if it takes a student five years? How many kids are five credits from graduation?”

Neither Bruckner nor Black was willing to blame the drop in the graduation rate solely on a change in the way students were counted.

“I’m not sure the change in calculation explains the difference,” Black said. “We need to look into reasons. We need to spend time with this to understand what it means.”

Iowa began using student identification numbers in 2005, allowing districts to track each student through high school, even if the student moved to another school district. Iowa’s class of 2009 is the first group of graduates who used the assigned statewide ID number.

“We’ve been able to track the kids,” Black said. “Now the state can count and verify the numbers. It’s a calculation rather than an estimate. The data is more accurate.”

Both the Council Bluffs and Lewis Central districts have emphasized programs such as student interventions, credit recovery programs and dropout prevention to boost graduation rates.

“Our goal is to get every kid to graduate in four years,” Black said. “It’s not unlike what every school in the nation is doing.”

Bruckner pointed out that the Council Bluffs district has begun a slow but steady climb that started in 2007, when the 70.40 percent graduation rate was the lowest of the eight largest Iowa school districts.

“We’re not sitting around waiting for numbers to come out,” Bruckner said. “We want a 100 percent graduation rate in 2015. We’re tracking all the seventh-graders to get them to graduate. We’ll be supporting them, and we’ll be dogging them.”

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