HAMLET — Richmond County Schools is proud to release the accountability results for the 2019-20 academic year which contains only one accountability measure, Cohort Graduation Rate, due to the early school closures and subsequent Federal Waiver of all state testing used for accountability.
The graduation rate for 2019-20 gained 4 percent over the six-year average, showing gains at all high schools and across subgroups. Our district-average this year of 84 percent is just 3.5 points off the state average of 87.6 percent, showing that Richmond County Schools is making great progress toward increasing the overall graduation rate.
It is important to know that our graduation rate is measured by when a student enters ninth grade. From that time, the student is set into a four-year cohort and expected to graduate within that four years. Our schools systematically monitor students in each of our four high school cohorts for all four years in order to make sure that they graduate, and that they graduate on time.
During this school year, our high schools had the additional challenge of trying to monitor students remotely, stay in contact with them, provide instruction and resources to students and get them over the finish line during the COVID crisis. Even with the crisis we have faced and school being suspended in March, all of our high schools showed gains in their graduation rates. This increase is due to the solid systems in place to track students, and a lot of hard work on behalf of principals, teachers, and school counselors to care for the needs of each individual student.
Individual school reporting shows Richmond Early College with a graduation rate of 100 percent. Richmond Senior High School made a 4 percent gain over the previous year, reporting an 84 percent graduation rate, higher than the previous three years. Ashley Chapel Educational
Center shows a gain of 8 percent over last year, with a graduation rate of 57 percent.
Richmond County Schools reports that each subgroup, American Indian, Black, Hispanic, White, Female, and Male all gained between 2 percent and 10 percent over the previous year. The subgroup with the highest graduation rate is the black subgroup at 89 percent, which is five points above the state average for this subgroup. The subgroup showing the greatest gain is seen in the American Indian subgroup at 84 percent, showing a full 10-point gain over last year, putting it three points above the state average for this subgroup.
“The principals and their administrative teams have worked so hard on the graduation rate, and their work is definitely making a difference for the students at every high school in Richmond County,” said Director of Testing and Accountability Jennifer Taylor.
“We are very proud of the increase in our high school graduation rate and I want to congratulate the students, parents, teachers, counselors, administrators and support staff for this outstanding achievement,” said Superintendent Jeff Maples. “The diligent work from those who provided the opportunities for students who needed some extra help, developing those strong personal relationships and tracking students to make sure they did not get behind. I think it really comes down to looking at each individual student and making sure we know what they need and putting great people around them to give them support and resources they need to be successful. It is our goal to continue to provide students more exposure to college and what life can be like after high school, whether the path may be military, college or right to the workforce.”
Cohort Graduation Rate is only one of many important measures in calculating School Performance Grades for our high schools, however as a result of the school closures and lack of test results for the 2019-20 school year, no school performance grades will be calculated nor publicly reported by North Carolina Department of Public Instruction.
For more information about accountability measurements and school performance grades, please visit the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction website.
