The state’s high school graduation rate rose for the fifth consecutive year, reaching 90.1 percent in 2016, a 0.4 percent increase from the year before, the state Department of Education announced January 12. This marks the fifth straight year that the statewide high school graduation rate has increased.
The Class of 2011 was the first graduating class to begin using the federally mandated methodology for calculating the graduation rate, and since then, the state’s high school graduation rate has increased by 7.1 percentage points from 83 percent in 2011. Below is a summary of 2016 graduation rates by student subgroups compared to the 2011 results:
- African American students graduated at a rate of 82.1 percent in 2016, an increase of 13.1 percentage points from 2011, when it was 69 percent.
- 83.4 percent of Hispanic students graduated in 2016, a 10.4 percentage point increase from 2011, when it was 73 percent.
- 94.2 percent of white students graduated in 2016, an increase from 90 percent in 2011.
- 96.7 percent of Asian students graduated in 2016, an increase from 93 percent in 2011.
- Economically disadvantaged students graduated at a rate of 82.7 percent in 2016, an increase of 11.7 percentage points from 2011, when it was 71 percent.
The Department also calculated the five-year graduation rate for students that began high school in 2011. While the four-year graduation rate last year was 89.7 percent for the class of 2015, the graduation rate that included students who continued on for a fifth year was 91.3 percent.
Additional information and district-by-district graduation rates