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Graduation Rate Calculation To Get Overhaul
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Published: June 18, 2008
TAMPA - Florida high school staff are in line to become detectives, tracking down and verifying every student leaving their school.
It's part of a federal push to standardize high school graduation rates nationwide by 2011-12.
Florida is getting ready for the new way to count and confirm, the state Board of Education was told Tuesday at its meeting in Tampa.
But the calculation is only accurate if a standard formula is used and if each district knows how many high school students it gained, how many it lost and where they went. Confirming where each student lands - in the school district, in another state, private school, home school, adult program or on the street - would bring credibility to an education statistic that has little.
Florida's latest graduation rate of 72.4 percent in 2006-07 would be 70.3 percent if calculated by proposed U.S. Department of Education standards, Jay Pfeiffer, a deputy commissioner for Florida's Department of Education, told the board.
At the district level, however, discrepancies between the state and proposed federal calculations can be greater, he said: "It does differ within the school districts, some six to eight points."
Nationally, states have long been accused of manipulating graduation rates.
With states using dozens of formulas, U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings announced April 1 that all states would have to use a standardized calculation by 2011. Details are to be worked out.
Florida calculates its graduation rate three ways. Pfeiffer said:
•One rate includes standard and special diplomas and both regular and adult General Educational Development certificates. It has been used since 1998-99.
•Another, for the federal No Child Left Behind law, includes standard diplomas and regular GEDs, but excludes special diplomas and adult GEDs.
•A third rate includes standard and special diplomas, but excludes all GEDs. The proposed national calculation is a version of this.
Florida will have input into details for the national calculation, Pfeiffer said, and can argue for including students who take five or six years to get through high school and those who fall behind and earn a GED in high school.
Graduation rates will be used in calculating Florida's school grades beginning next year, but which formula has not been determined.
Spellings' proposal for calculating the graduation rate uses the number of students who graduate in the standard number of years with a regular diploma divided by the number of students who entered ninth grade four years earlier. Adjustments would be made for students transferring in and out.
Accuracy with students transferring in and out has been questionable because of the work it takes at schools to track and verify their whereabouts.
Using the class of 2006-07 as an example, Pfeiffer said it started in 2003-04 with 225,000 ninth-graders and ended with 195,000 seniors in 2007. During that time, schools reported an estimated 43,600 new students transferred in, 58,000 students moved to other states, 280 died, 6,300 transferred to private schools, 2,200 left to be home-schooled and 17,000 went to adult education.
Hillsborough Superintendent MaryEllen Elia said it "will be tough" to verify students who leave the state or transfer to private schools because of staffing and funding issues.
Also Tuesday, Elia was recognized by the state board as one of two recipients of a new award by the Florida Public School Choice Consortium that gives a half scholarship at Nova Southeastern University's Fischler School of Education at either the masters or doctorate level.
Elia said later she does not have time to pursue a doctorate now, and hopes she may transfer the scholarship to someone deserving in the district.
The other recipient is Carla McMullen, school choice specialist with Polk County Schools.
Hillsborough's status in sanctioning and overseeing its charter schools is in line for review by a state hearing officer, it was noted Tuesday.
For more than a decade, Florida charter schools were sanctioned and overseen by school districts. In 2006, a new law created a state-level commission to give charters an alternative for approval and oversight.
Hillsborough applied to retain exclusivity, but was denied. It has appealed and will be granted a hearing. In the meantime, it oversees its 27 charter schools and has approved four more to open in August. If granted exclusivity, charters could opt to stay under district control or apply to the new state commission.
Charter schools are operated by private individuals or private or public organizations, but funded by taxpayers. They are free of most government regulations except for testing, health and safety.
Reporter Marilyn Brown can be reached at (813) 259-8069 or mbrown@tampatrib.com.
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