The Never-ending Grad Rate Story

Here’s some lousy timing: IES just released their grad rate calculations. Will they get much ink in the midst of the Swanson Storm? But, here they are for your reading pleasure (pdf). Don’t miss page four, a nicely done walk-through of caveats (especially the definitional issues which are really confusing this debate). Punchline: Marginally higher rates in some states than Swanson reports, substantially higher in some others. But substantially lower than the debunkers are claiming and closer to the various cumulative methods.

Update: NSBA’s Patte Barth — she’s the former Ed Truster at the helm of this new outfit they have the “Center for Public Education”– does an online discussion of various grad rate issues. The functionality is a little off but worth dealing with it because the content is on.