Officials with the Superior School Board are evaluating ways to improve the graduation rate of students enrolled in their district.  According to news sources, the overall graduation rate for students in Superior is 84.3% - which is significantly lower than the overall average for all Wisconsin schools.  In fact, that number represents the 15th lowest ranking for a school district in the entire state.

An article in the Superior Telegram details the problem.  While the statewide average for graduation rates was 90.6%, the percentage for Superior stands out.  "Even districts with roughly the same number of students of similar socio-economic status, race, and ethnicity breakdowns were 'massively outperforming' Superior in terms of graduation rates".

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What's equally concerning is that that low graduation rate deviates from district test scores.  While the graduation rate has Superior rounding out the bottom part of the statewide list, those individual student scores are more-or-less the opposite.  According to Kate Tesch - Director of Continuous Improvement and Assessment:

"Superior students score in roughly the 40th percentile statewide in test scores, while it's in the bottom couple percentage points for graduation rates. So our kids are achieving at a higher level than they're graduating, not because they aren't able to learn and demonstrate their learning.  There are other things that are obviously preventing them from earning the credits."

And without an effort to correct the problem, things don't look like they'll be changing.  The current graduation rate of 84.3% was representative of the 2019 - 2020 school year.  Superior School District Administrator Amy Starzecki shared that "[w]e already have 49 students (out of 320) at the end of ninth grade that are off track for graduation."

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