Academia, Politics, Society

D.C. Schools Post the Lowest High School Graduation Rate In The Nation

Washington, D.C. had the worst high school graduation rate in the country in 2011 — down roughly 20 percent from just two years ago. The drop appears partially the result of a new (and better) accounting system that tracks actual students rather than allowing a ridiculous calculation method that tended to inflate numbers. Nevada had the lowest graduation rate of any state (62 percent) and D.C. did worse than Native American reservations (61 percent). The best state was Iowa with 88 percent followed by Vermont and Wisconsin (both at 87 percent).


The rate in Washington, D.C. for 2009-2010 was 76 percent rate. The current figure is a disgrace and shows a continuing failure of the school system with 71,284 students in 191 schools. The district received $98.3 million dollars in federal funding during 2011.

With over four out of ten students not graduating on time in D.C., the school system has long been criticized for poor teacher quality and management. In comparison to the 58 percent rate, Fairfax (the affluent suburb next door has an almost 92 percent graduation rate). Clearly the comparison with Fairfax must taken into account an obvious difference in the extreme level of poverty and violence that faces the D.C. school system. This is no easy task when the schools must deal with crippling socio-economic problems. However, the D.C. schools are well behind other school systems facing similar challenges.

In 2008, the federal government required that states and D.C. stop using a questionable system where they simply divided the number of students receiving diplomas by the number of those who started ninth grade four years earlier. That calculation inflated the numbers of graduates. Now they must track individual students.

As a long supporter of public schools, I find these figures incredibly depressing. Leslie and I have kept our kids in public schools because we are strong believers in the role of public schools in our society as well as the more pluralistic environment for learning. These schools are the bedrock for our society and their decline does not bode well for our future. The over 40 percent of kids not graduating are set on a path that will limit their opportunities and personal growth as adults. It is not only tragic for them but tragic for society.

Frankly it also shows a continuing failure of the D.C. government to meet this basic obligation. D.C. politicians tend to blame Congress for its ills despite the fact that the District (with considerable federal support) spends the most of any school system in the nation: $18,667 per pupil. Yet, it produces the worst results of any system. SAT reading scores are at a four decade low in D.C. That is not just a factor of socio-economics as other major cities have shown. It is a failure of leadership and competence.

Source: Washington Post

48 thoughts on “D.C. Schools Post the Lowest High School Graduation Rate In The Nation”

  1. nick spinelli:

    in regards Rhee, yep. She was starting to make the system work for the children.

  4. Bruce 1, November 29, 2012 at 10:38 am

    D.C. a predominately Democratic area producing more Democrats.
    =====================================================
    So is the United States.

  6. The DC Teacher’s Union ran Michelle Rhee out of town and graduation rates fall of the cliff. Let the students and parents eat cake.

  7. When these kids grow up to be cowboys CEO of the Twinkie Kingdom, they can get jiggy wid it:

    Hostess Brands Inc. plans to ask for a judge’s approval Thursday to give its top executives bonuses totaling up to $1.8 million as part of its wind-down plans.

    The maker of Twinkies, Ding Dongs and Ho Hos says the incentive pay is needed to retain the 19 managers during the liquidation process, which could take about a year. Two of those executives would be eligible for additional rewards depending on how efficiently they carry out the liquidation.

    (Twinklle Dum). Enrightenment is not just for Easterners anymore.

  8. Pat Robertson has overcome some educational deficiencies:

    Look, I know that people will probably try to lynch me when I say this, but Bishop [James] Ussher wasn’t inspired by the Lord when he said that it all took 6,000 years. It just didn’t. You go back in time, you’ve got radiocarbon dating. You got all these things and you’ve got the carcasses of dinosaurs frozen in time out in the Dakotas.

    They’re out there. So, there was a time when these giant reptiles were on the Earth and it was before the time of the Bible. So, don’t try and cover it up and make like everything was 6,000 years. That’s not the Bible.

    (Old Angels, Young Angels Feel Awright). The science of Agnotology may have just taken a big hit.

  9. Something along the lines of 40% of DC school children are enrolled in charter schools. I wonder how much this plays into the final numbers?

    I have always believed that a solid education is the foundation of a great society. It’s no wonder we are no longer a great society.

  11. JT: You did not mention in the article the percentage of DC kids who go to private or charter schools. Contrast THAT with Iowa. If you take all the kids who graduate from the Charter schools and the private schools and add them to the total number of public schools you will have a different percentage. It is probable that even the poorest family can have a bright kid and a bright mom who will send the kid to a charter school or get some scholarship or some aid for a private school.

    But, that aside. Many will blame the teachers. Some of whom, cant teach.

    But that aside, I will blame the parents. If they are sitting on a welfare ass then they have time to make johnboy tend to studies. How many kids have both parents show up at school meetings between parents and teachers? Where is daddy? If he aint locked up he ought to be there. Dont blame daddy. Mommy might want to be independent and not have the sperm donor around.

    It would not hurt to take some of the money out of the system. What! How can that help? What! I say. How could it hurt?

  13. The question is, where is all that money (the high cost per student) going? Surely someone is investigating that, and I look forward to reading the answer.

  14. First Collector: At this festive time of year, Mr. Scrooge, it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the poor and destitute.
    Ebenezer: Are there no prisons?
    First Collector: Plenty of prisons.
    Ebenezer: And the union workhouses – are they still in operation?
    First Collector: They are. I wish I could say they were not.
    Ebenezer: Oh, from what you said at first I was afraid that something had happened to stop them in their useful course. I’m very glad to hear it.
    First Collector: I don’t think you quite understand us, sir. A few of us are endeavoring to buy the poor some meat and drink, and means of warmth.
    Ebenezer: Why?
    First Collector: Because it is at Christmastime that want is most keenly felt, and abundance rejoices. Now what can I put you down for?
    Ebenezer: Huh! Nothing!
    Second Collector: You wish to be anonymous?
    Ebenezer: [firmly, but calmly] I wish to be left alone. Since you ask me what I wish sir, that is my answer. I help to support the establishments I have named; those who are badly off must go there.
    First Collector: Many can’t go there.
    Second Collector: And some would rather die.

  15. Darren, your comment should be in the Washing Post this am.

    ….. Also if these rankings were applied to approval ratings, your comment describes our Congress perfectly. Is bureaucratic S.A.I. an airborne disease?

  16. We have wars to engage in….. Not win…. That’s too simple….. And to show you how good education is…. We have…. No child left behind….. Now children as a group…. Forget it….. We need them to engage in the fight…… If you make em too smart…. They won’t go….. Kinda simple logic……

  17. ” spends the most of any school system in the nation: $18,667 per pupil. Yet, it produces the worst results of any system”

    It doesn’t get any worse than that. What are the odds of that happening by random circumstance? The most costly AND the worst performing in a nation of 300 million + persons. The failure almost seems intentional, like the old addage “They want to fail”.

    Thus seems a true paradox, in order to be successful in achieving BOTH the most expensive AND the worst performing in the nation it seems it would require a very orchestrated and diligent effort to win both at the same time. Yet, the incompetence and disorganization resident in the school board is so vast as evidenced by the result, how could they achieve any distinction at all?

    Sadly, Abraham Maslow is not alive today. The officials responsible for this would be a good study group for the idea of Self Actualized Incompetence.

    Maybe they should be nominated for the bureaucrat of the year award: Costs the most money, achieves the worst results, blames others the most, accepts responsibility the least, causes the most damage, has the most tenure.

    The students are the ones that are getting the worst of it unfortunately.

  18. You can believe in and support public schooling without sending your children there; in fact the reduced load might be good for the schools.

    I believe in supporting free clinics with my donations, but I do not use them.

  19. “As a long supporter of public schools, I find these figures incredibly depressing. Leslie and I have kept our kids in public schools because we are strong believers in the role of public schools in our society as well as the more pluralistic environment for learning. These schools are the bedrock for our society and their decline does not bode well for our future.”

    If only it stopped at the lower school levels, but it does not:

    One of the most important comments on deceit, I think, was made by Adam Smith. He pointed out that a major goal of business is to deceive and oppress the public.

    And one of the striking features of the modern period is the institutionalization of that process, so that we now have huge industries deceiving the public—and they’re very conscious about it, the public relations industry. Interestingly, this developed in the freest countries—in Britain and the US—roughly around time of WWI, when it was recognized that enough freedom had been won that people could no longer be controlled by force. So modes of deception and manipulation had to be developed in order to keep them under control.

    And by now these are huge industries. They not only dominate marketing of commodities, but they also control the political system. As anyone who watches a US election knows, it’s marketing. It’s the same techniques that are used to market toothpaste.

    And, of course, there are power systems in place to facilitate this. Throughout history it’s been mostly the property holders or the educated classes who’ve tended to support power systems. And that’s a large part of what I think education is—it’s a form of indoctrination. You have to reconstruct a picture of the world in order to be conducive to the interests and concerns of the educated classes, and this involves a lot of self-deceit.

    (Dr. Noam Chomsky). The MIT professor thinks the U.S.eh? system is propagandist from head to toe.

  20. A fitting place for the neoCon warmongering global climate change deniers to go to play pretend they can govern. An exceptional place in fact.

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