By MIKE COURSON
Great Bend Post
Graduation rates for the USD 428 Great Bend school district are looking good. Assistant Superintendent John Popp reported at Monday's July board of education meeting that district graduation rates are not only on the rise but also come in higher than state averages.
"You can see the state has also gone up over the last several years, but our rate of improvement has exceeded the state's substantially," Popp told the board. "That's good data."
In 2015, the district's 80.6 percent graduation rate was five points below the state average of 85.7 percent. Though the state average has improved each year since to 88.1 percent in 2021, Great Bend High School's graduation rate has climbed even faster with big jumps in 2019 and 2020. GBHS saw a 91.3 percent graduation rate in 2020, and a 92.5 percent rate in 2021.
"That's a steady improvement, the highest it's been in years and years," Popp said. "That's a very monumental achievement by our entire district."
The data tracks all students for four years once they enroll as freshmen. Students who transfer in and out of the district are also transferred in the data. Students have through the summer to finish credits and graduate, so Class of 2022 figures were unavailable at Monday's meeting.
Popp also showed the board post-secondary effectiveness rates for the district, or how many students are continuing their education after high school. Based on demographics, the state predicts a rate of 35.5 to 40.1 percent for the district. USD 428 exceeded that expectation in 2019 with 43 percent continuing a second year of post-secondary education.
"The goal of this is not 100 percent," said Popp. "The goal of this is 70 to 75 percent of students continue on in some way. We know there are a whole lot of kids who are very successful just going onto the family farm, or another metric not in here is military service. They may be very successful people but they haven't continued in a post-secondary type of way."
For the 2021-22 school year, Great Bend High School saw 14 students withdraw from education. At least three of those students chose Barton County Academy or other GED programs to continue their education.