Comments on: Decatur High School Graduation Rate Ranks in Georgia’s Top 10

By: At Home in Decatur

At Home in Decatur — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 23:13:28 +0000

The dreaded “undefined” got me on this post before I finished. I was trying to add that it is important to know–and CSD may know this already but just hasn’t shared it widely–what are the factors associated with our non graduation rate. Just unmotivated or unhappy at school? Pregnancy? (Used to be an issue but I don’t believe it’s as much of one now) Failing required courses? Failing end-of-course tests? Kids moving into our system? Kids who’ve been with us all along? Is this the solution mostly at the high school level? Or do we need to do something earlier to improve our instruction for certain types of learners? Sometimes a failure to learn is more about a failure to teach certain kinds of learners. And whatever is learned may not just help those who are not graduating but also those who are graduating but not reaching their academic potential. A rising tide raises all ships or whatever the saying is….

By: At Home in Decatur

At Home in Decatur — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 21:17:48 +0000

Big article on front page of AJC today re graduation rates. I still say that it is possible to get the DHS rate as high as the high schools that have rates over 90%. But it will take putting resources into helping the individual children at risk with their unique and individual problems. It’s more fun to work on the program or curriculum level but sometimes some high intensity elbow grease on the actual problem spots is called for.

By: Decaturight

Decaturight — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 17:57:02 +0000

Here is my bold prediction…THIS group will have a 100% graduation rate!! Way to go kids!

By: Marty

Marty — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 14:15:10 +0000

When looking at the 1940 Census records that came out week, one of the questions was how many years of high school did you complete. I was initially a little surprised that my grandmother (who was born in 1911) had only completed one year of high school. I never knew that. And from my memories of her, she seemed like an adult of above average intelligence and success in life.

But, of course, it was a way different time back then. Not only was not completing high school the norm, but it was especially true for girls.

But the point being, that it is a rather recent thing for it to be the norm for all children to complete high school – much less go to college. And even today only about 20% even complete college and get a bachelors degree. A much smaller percentage get a graduate degree of some kind.

So, while in a perfect world, all of our kids would complete high school and go to college, it is not nearly a perfect world. Looking at the numbers, it appears we’re doing a pretty good job.

By: macarolina

macarolina — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 13:59:49 +0000

I agree we should be congratulating teachers (thanks Wow), and I throw out another group to congratulate– all the parents and other community volunteers who spend their time, efforts and donated funds/services to help make CSD a continually improving service organization. I agree with AHID regarding CSD’s lower(ing) population of at risk kids as having an impact on our comparative stats in the Metro area, but I think the concentration of efforts of many in the community and small school district have helped improve CSD for all at a great pace.

Couple of things- 1. No one has mentioned that CSD was tops in Metro Atlanta (Wheeler after CSD). 2. Some alluded to it, but from other articles I saw that CSD’s grad stats didn’t change much at all with the new calcs, unlike some other districts with “stats” that drastically shifted with the uniform calculation.

Finally, one item not mentioned yet impacting graduation rate– some kids move around and switch schools at an astounding rate due to family circumstances– I heard a talk from metro educators that shocked me with the stats of how many kids in their class moved in/out during the school year. I think I’ve heard that the new calc method makes districts responsible for making sure students enrolled in another school before taking that student out of their nongrad pot- may be hard to do with so much movement. Coming from a small town, with classmates that were almost always the same, I hadn’t realized that was happening to the extent it does in a larger metro area. I’d be curious at the classroom stability in CSD vs. other metro districts- I think it would correlate to the graduation rates.