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Two of the most important indicators of the educational system's
success are the rates that young people complete and drop out of
school each year. The Common Core of Data (CCD)
survey system of the National Center for Education Statistics
(NCES) annually collects information about public school dropouts
and completers. This report presents the number and percentage of
students dropping out and completing public school (among states
that reported dropouts) for school years 1998-99 and 1999-2000.
Background
The CCD consists of six surveys that are completed each year by
state education agencies (SEAs). Three of these surveys provide
basic statistical information about public elementary/secondary
institutions, students, and staff. Although all information is reported
directly from SEAs, the surveys include data about individual states,
local education agencies, and schools. The numbers of students who
complete high school with a regular diploma or some alternative
credential have been reported at the state and local education agency
levels since the 1987-88 CCD collection. A dropout statistic was
added to the Local Education Agency
(School District) Universe
beginning with the 1992-93 collection (reporting 1991-92 dropouts).
Limitations in This Report
The high school 4-year completion rate presented here differs in
its calculation from other published rates and readers should be
alert to this when making comparisons with other studies. The inclusion
of both regular and other high school completions, and the exclusion
of General Education Development (GED) test recipients, may also
lead to differences with other reports (see the "High
School Completers" section for a further description).
Also, state and local policies and data collection administration
may have profound effects on the count of dropouts and completers
reported by a state. Dropout and completion data collected by the
CCD are reported from the administrative records of SEAs. Some states
collect their data through student-level records systems while others
collect aggregate data from schools and districts. Although state
CCD Coordinators verify each year that they have followed the CCD
dropout definition, states vary in their ability to track students
who move in and out of districts, and it is probable that some students
have been misclassified.
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High School Dropouts
Determining Dropout Status
The CCD definition determines whether an individual is a dropout
by his or her enrollment status at the beginning of the school year
(the same day reflected in the enrollment count). Beginning in 1990,
NCES defined a dropout as an individual who
- was enrolled in school at some time during the previous school
year (e.g., 1998-99); and
- was not enrolled at the beginning of the current school year
(e.g., 1999-2000); and
- has not graduated from high school or completed a state- or
district-approved educational program; and
- does not meet any of the following exclusionary conditions:
- transfer to another public school district, private school,
or state- or district-approved educational program (including
correctional or health facility programs);
- temporary absence due to suspension or school-excused illness;
or
- death.
Individuals who complete 1 year of school but fail to enroll at the
beginning of the subsequent year ("summer dropouts") are counted as
dropouts from the school year and grade in which they fail to enroll.
Those who leave secondary education but are enrolled in an adult education
program at the beginning of the school year are considered dropouts.
However, note that dropout status is determined by a student's status
on October 1. Students who receive their GED certificate by October
1 are not counted as dropouts if the state or district recognizes
this as an approved program. Although a student whose whereabouts
is unknown is considered a dropout, states are not required to count
students who leave the United States as dropouts even if there is
no information about such students' subsequent enrollment status.
A student can be counted as a dropout only once for a single school
year but can, if he or she repeatedly drops out and re-enrolls, appear
as a dropout in more than 1 year.
Dropout Rate
This is an annual event dropout rate: the number of dropouts for
a school year divided by the number of students enrolled at the
beginning of that school year. For example, to compute the 9th-
through 12th-grade dropout rate, the calculation is
Number of 9th- through 12th-grade dropouts
October 1st 9th- through 12th-grade enrollment count
Dropout Results
In the 1999-2000 school year, 37 states (including the District
of Columbia), and in the 1998-99 school year, 38 states (including
the District of Columbia), reported dropouts using the CCD definition.
The change in the number of states between the two collection periods
occurred because Arizona and Idaho did not report dropouts using
the CCD definition in 1999-2000, while Texas did report them using
the CCD definition in 1999-2000 but not in 1998-99. Table 1 presents
data on 1999-2000 and 1998-99 dropouts. In the 1999-2000 school
year, the 9th- through 12th-grade dropout rate in the reporting
states ranged from 2.5 percent in Iowa to 9.2 percent in Louisiana.
In the 1998-99 school year, the dropout rate ranged from 2.4 percent
in North Dakota to 10.0 percent in Louisiana.
The majority of reporting states in 1999-2000 (24 of the 37) had
dropout rates ranging from 4.0 to 6.0 percent. Eight states had
a dropout rate lower than 4.0 in the 1999-2000 school year: Connecticut,
Iowa, Maine, New Jersey, North Dakota, South Dakota, Virginia, and
Wisconsin. In 1998-99, the number of states with dropout rates ranging
from 4.0 to 6.0 was smaller, only 20 out of the 38. Nine states
had a dropout rate lower than 4.0 in the 1998-99 school year: Connecticut,
Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania,
and Wisconsin.
Because of the differing sizes of states, the numbers of dropouts
varied greatly among reporting states. In the 1999-2000 school year,
while Texas had the greatest number of dropouts (54,390) among reporting
states, it did not have the highest dropout rate. On the other hand,
North Dakota had the smallest number of dropouts (1,003) and also
had the third lowest dropout rate (2.7 percent) of reporting states.
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High School Completers
Diploma recipients
These are individuals who are awarded a high school diploma or a
diploma in a given year that recognizes some higher level of academic
achievement. They can be thought of as students who meet or exceed
the coursework and performance standards for high school completion
established by the state or other relevant authorities.
Other high school completers
These individuals receive a certificate of attendance or some other
credential in lieu of a diploma. Students awarded this credential
typically meet requirements that differ from those for a high school
diploma. Some states do not issue an "other high school completion"
type of certificate, but award all students who complete school
a diploma regardless of what academic requirements the students
have met. In order to make data as comparable as possible across
states, this report includes both regular and other diploma recipients
in its high school 4-year completion rate.
Exclusion of high school equivalency recipients
High school equivalencies are awarded a credential certifying that
they have met state or district requirements for high school completion
by passing an examination or completing some other performance requirement.
The equivalency certificate is usually awarded on the basis of the
GED test. The CCD asks states to report high school equivalency
recipients who are in roughly the same cohort as the regular graduating
class, that is, 19 years of age or younger. Although students who
receive their GED from a state- or district-recognized program by
October 1 are not counted as dropouts in the dropout rate calculation,
there are two reasons that GED counts are not included in the count
of high school completers (i.e., they are counted as dropouts) in
the 4-year completion rate. First, the count of high school equivalencies
is only reported on the CCD's state collection and the other data
collected and used in the four-year completion rate are at the school
district level. Second, not all states report the total number of
GED recipients.
High School 4-Year Completion Rate
Put simply, this rate asks, "of those students who have left school,
what proportion have done so as completers?" The rate incorporates
4 years' worth of data and thus, is an estimated cohort rate. It
is calculated by dividing the number of high school completers by
the sum of dropouts for grades 9 through 12, respectively, in consecutive
years, plus the number of completers. If a hypothetical graduating
class began as 9th-graders in Year 1, this 4-year completion rate
would look like:
High School Completers Year 4
Dropouts (Grade 9 Year 1 + Grade 10 Year 2 + Grade 11 Year 3 + Grade
12 Year 4)
+ High School Completers Year 4
To get a more detailed description of the development of both
rates as well as the limitations of the dropout and completion rates,
see Public High
School Dropouts and Completers From the Common Core of Data: School
Years 1991-92 through 1997-98 (NCES 2002317).
High School Completer Results
As with states' numbers of high school dropouts, states' numbers
of high school completers varied widely, partially because of the
sizes of states' public school populations. As might be expected,
in 1999-2000, the state with the largest public school population,
California, had the most high school completers (309,866), and the
District of Columbia, with the smallest public school population,
had the fewest high school completers (2,916) (table 2). Seven states
had more than 100,000 high school completers: California, Florida,
Illinois, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Texas.
In the 1999-2000 school year, the 4 years of dropout data needed
to calculate a high school 4-year completion rate were available
for 33 states. The high school 4-year completion rates ranged from
a high of 89.3 in Wisconsin to a low of 62.6 in Louisiana for those
states with data. (This rate includes other high school completers
but does not reflect those receiving a GED-based equivalency credential.)
In 1999-2000, eight of the reporting states had a 4-year completion
rate above 85 percent: Connecticut, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts,
Nebraska, New Jersey, North Dakota, and Wisconsin. Four states had
4-year completion rates below 75 percent: Georgia, Louisiana, Nevada,
and New Mexico.
The majority of high school completion credentials are in the
form of a diploma. There were 32 reporting states with data available
to calculate a 1999-2000 high school 4-year completion rate that
either reported other high school completer data (i.e., certificates
of completion) or did not award any type of other high school completer
credentials. Other high school completers made up only 1.5 percent
of all high school completers in these 32 reporting states (derived
from table 2). Twenty-two of these states awarded other high school
completion credentials (the other 10 states did not award these
credentials) and had data necessary to calculate a 1999-2000 4-year
completion rate for other high school completers (e.g., recipients
of certificates of completion). In 5 of these 22 states - Alabama,
Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, and Tennessee - the percent of all
students who completed by means of another high school completion
credential was 5 percent or more.
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