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Ohio lags in minority grad rates

Source: Cincinnati.com

Ohio''s public schools are losing about half their African American and Hispanic students before they graduate from high school, making the state among the nation''s worst at graduating minority students, two recent national reports show.




Diplomas Count 2010, put out by the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center in Bethesda, Md., found that only 47.5 percent of Ohio''s black public school seniors graduated on time in 2007, the most recent data available for state comparisons.

That makes Ohio eighth worst in graduating black high school students.

The national average graduation rate for African American students is 53.7 percent, the study says.

Another report by the National Center for Education Statistics, using different calculations, lists Ohio''s black graduation rate at 55.5 percent in 2007, sixth- worst in the nation.

"Regardless of what study we look at, we see this gap," said Scott Blake, spokesman for Ohio''s Department of Education. "We have made strides in certain areas, but it hasn''t been completely resolved."

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