District graduation rate increases, officials stress need for improvement
Despite a tick upward, the School District of Lee County’s graduation rate remains ninth among the 10 largest districts in the state.
The district rate rose by 0.7% to 85.8% year over year.
Florida’s graduation rate was 89.7% for 2023-24.
“Increasing student achievement is one of my top priorities as superintendent and the improvement in graduation rates is testament to the hard work of our students, teachers, school administrators and support staff,” Superintendent Dr. Denise Carlin said in a prepared statement. “At the same time, the graduation rate also demonstrates our continued need to work harder to meet and surpass the improvements seen by other districts and the state, so we truly are a world class school district. I am committed to ensuring we have the teachers and resources we need to improve academic excellence and student achievement.”
The 2022-23 graduation rate was 85.1%, 2021-22 was 82.5%, 2020-21 was 85.1%, 2019-20 was 88.5%, 2018-19 was 83.7% and 2017-18 was 82.8%.
According to the district, the 2019-20 graduation rate was artificially inflated due to the exemption for seniors from statewide, standardized assessment requirements, which was stipulated by state law due to the COVID pandemic.
Among the notable increases were Cypress Lake High School, which increased by 5.6 points to 94.3%; Lehigh Senior High School, which had an increase by 3.6 points to 89.2%; Riverdale High School, which increased by 3.4 points to 97.6%; and Lee Virtual School, which had a graduation rate of 100% for the Class of 2024.
The graduation rate for the district’s 15 high schools and Lee Virtual School, which eliminates charter schools within the district, was 93%.
Chief Academic Officer Dr. Nathan Shaker said the district is celebrating the recent increase because it is a move in the right direction.
“Is there room to still grow? Absolutely,” he said. “We know that up against the Big Ten it is not the highest. (There is) still lots of room to grow. I am incredibly proud of the staff and students for the growth. We look forward to improvement year over year.”
District staff is approaching it not only from the graduation rate, but also from the dropout rate.
“We are holding more students in school in pursuit of graduation,” Shaker said.
He attributes the bump to preparing students with English Language Arts, as well as seeing great performance and strong increases in math.
“An effort by high school teachers and staff to prepare students in math had a big influence,” Shaker said. “They had laser-light focus on increasing the graduation rate.”
He said the opportunities for high school students also increased the graduation rate, as the district has a great group of college and career specialists and counselors who work with each student.
“They find out what individual students need that were at risk for dropping out and helping them with those individual needs and achieving that goal of staying in school,” Shaker said.
The effort also includes high school teachers who prepared students.
The Lee County dropout rate is fourth overall with a 1.8% rate, compared to last year’s rate of 2.4%. Some of the other districts ranged from 2.2% to 4.4%, he said. The goal of this year and next for increasing the graduation rate is through ELA performance and reading proficiency. The district is increasing training for high school administration and school staff. The training will be for understanding the challenges in front of students, reading based training on programs teaching students, as well as skills to prepare for ACT, SAT and reading proficiency.
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