By Kristin Decarr
A new report released this week suggests that American schools are still on track to reach the national goal of having 90% of high school students graduate on time by 2020.
The 2015 report, Building A Grad Nation, which was released by America’s Promise Alliance, Civic Enterprises, Everyone Graduates Center, and the Alliance for Excellent Education, is the sixth annual update on the topic.
According to the most recent data from the National Center for Education Statistics at the U.S. Department of Education, the nation saw a record high of 81.4% of high schoolers graduate on time in 2013. This is in part due to an increase in the graduation rates of minority and low-income students.
The US has seen an increase in the graduation rate of Latino students of 4.2 percentage points between 2011 and 2013. At the same time, African American students generated an increase of 3.7 percentage points. These gains have also allowed for the closing of the graduation rate among these groups with their white peers.