Daley: CPS graduation rate 'on-track' to rise in 2012
SCHOOLS | 8% jump predicted for 2012 based on records of freshmen, Daley says
Chicago Public Schools are in for a "dramatic increase" in graduation rates in 2012 -- equal to the population of an entire high school -- thanks to an 8 percent jump in the number of freshman "on-track," Mayor Daley said Friday.
To be "on-track," freshmen must fail no more than one semester of a core course and earn a minimum of five credits by the end of their first year in high school.
(Sun-Times File)
Those who achieve that status are four times more likely to graduate than their slacker classmates, according to the University of Chicago's Consortium on Chicago School Research.
The freshman on-track rate for the school year that ended in June was 64 percent, an 8 percent jump from the year before.
Even more impressive is the 41 percent increase -- to 60.8 percent -- in the number of freshman "on-track" at Harper High School in impoverished Englewood.
Harper, where Daley spoke, is a so-called "turnaround" school where the principal and teachers were replaced just a year ago.
Schools CEO Ron Huberman predicted that 1,000 more CPS students would graduate on time by 2012 thanks to three programs that have eased the transition to high school.
The projection comes amid complaints from CPS teachers that they are being pressured to change grades and avoid F's that affect on-track and graduation rates.
An exclusive Chicago Sun-Times/Chicago Teachers Union survey last May found that nearly a third of CPS high school teachers said they were pressured to change grades last school year, and one in five said they actually raised a grade under such prodding.
"It's in the culture of the schools," wrote one high school teacher who raised many grades under pressure -- and said at least one was changed without his approval. "You can't completely be honest in grading students, otherwise the failure rate would be off the chart."
Contributing: Rosalind Rossi