Failing High Schools

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One of the most serious problems in US high schools is the 33% overall rate of high school dropouts. The Alliance for Excellent Education has released an Issue Brief, Prioritizing the Nation’s Lowest-Performing High Schools that shows that 420,000 dropouts come from only 12% of the high schools. Schools that generate a large number of drop outs are termed low performing high schools (LPHS). Low performing high schools are represented in every state and are found in urban, suburban, rural, small towns and large cities. The U.S. Department of Education has made LPHS a priority.
Looking at the distribution of LPHS on a United States map we can see that the majority of the low performing high schools are found in the southeast and especially along the coast from Texas to Massachusetts, with the concentration in Florida and South Carolina. Every state has at least one low performing high school.
Nevada and South Carolina have the highest percentage of low performing high schools. The following chart lists states in terms of largest percentage of total schools that are considered low performing of all the schools within the state.
  1. Nevada                                                49%
  2. South Carolina                   45%
  3. New Mexico                      36%
  4. Delaware                             35%
  5. Florida                                  35%
  6. Georgia                                                34%
  7. Hawaii                                   25%
  8. North Carolina                   22%
  9. Alaska                                   20%
  10. Rhode Island                      17%
Fifteen percent of all US students attend a low performing high school. In Nevada, 60% of all high school students attend a low-performing high school, while 40% of all South Carolina students attend a low performing high school. In New Hampshire, Maine, Utah, Vermont, and West Virginia only 1% of students attend a LPHS.
Texas has the highest number of LPHS, while Vermont only has one and Maine, New Hampshire, West Virginia, and Wyoming are all tied with 2 LPHS.
Top Ten States with Highest Number of Low Performing High Schools
  1. Texas                                    183
  2. Florida                                  164
  3. California                             153
  4. New York                            133
  5. Georgia                                                120
  6. Michigan                               82
  7. South Carolina                    87
  8. North Carolina                    81
  9. Ohio                                       80
  10. Illinois                                    70
The locale for LPHS is varied. 51% of LPHS are found in the larger cities as one might anticipate, but 19% are suburban, 9% are in towns, and 21% are in rural areas. But while the locations of LPHS may be varied, the demography of the students who go to these schools is not varied. Three quarters of the total enrollment of LPHSs are minorities. This is twice the rate for students of color for high schools in general. But greater than ethnicity is the poverty of the students that attend these schools. 84% of the 1,800 LPHS are high-poverty schools. In these schools 40% or more of the students are eligible for free or reduced lunch.
Ironically, students who drop out face more poverty and an even more difficult future. Dropping out of school usually confirms a future of poverty.
While the federal government has a better understanding of the dropout dilemma it still does not have a systematic plan of how to improve the situation. Over the past ten years, despite federal efforts, the national graduation rate has only improved by 2.8%. This problem needs real attention from the federal policymakers.
As the report states, “Federal policymakers have an obligation to their constituents and the nation to use federal policy to address the dropout crisis and prioritize these high schools for massive transformation.”
Source: Prioritizing the Nation’s Lowest-Performing High Schools    Alliance for Excellent Education

 

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