Dropout rate in city doubles that of county

Charlottesville’s high school student dropout rate is more than double than that of Albemarle County and considerably higher than the state average, according to new figures released Tuesday by the Virginia Department of Education.

Roughly 13.2 percent of the city’s students who entered ninth grade in 2004 dropped out without receiving a diploma, GED or certificate of program completion. In Albemarle, that number stood at 6.5 percent, below the state average of 8.7 percent.

The new report includes dropout percentages as well as graduation and completion rates for students who began high school in the city and county in 2004 and were scheduled to graduate in the spring of 2008.

“We certainly have moved to address our dropout rate and we’ve more than doubled our programs to support high school graduation,” said Cass Cannon, a spokesperson for the city schooldivision. “We have things in motion to address what we’ve known, but that won’t show up for years to come.”

Some of the dropout figures for the two localities may question conventional assumptions of which groups are falling behind in public schools.

Though, statewide, far fewer females have dropped out than have males, Charlottesville’s female student dropout rate — at 13.3 percent — is higher than that of their male classmates’ 13 percent. In Albemarle, female students fared much better than males, with only 4.7 percent of females dropping out, compared with 8.4 percent of males.

The percentage of black students in Albemarle who dropped out, 6.1 percent, is less than half the state average of 12.6 percent. Blacks in Albemarle also fared slightly better than whites, 6.2 percent of whom dropped out.

Luvelle Brown, chief information officer for the county school system, said officials are pleased that the division had a lower dropout rate than the state average and that black students fared better than elsewhere in Virginia.

Brown said the fact that dropout rates for black students are far lower the state average is somewhat of an affirmation of the division’s efforts to close the achievement gap. However, the county’s dropout rate statistics aren’t all good news, Brown said, adding that school leaders will have to figure out why a higher percentage of disabled students in Albemarle have dropped out, 13.6 percent, compared with the state average of 13.5 percent.

“Maybe some of the things that we are doing with disabled students aren’t working as well [as initiatives to help black students],” Brown said. “We want that to be better.”

In Charlottesville, the black dropout rate was 15.4 percent, higher than both Albemarle and the state.

But a far lower percentage of students with disabilities dropped out in the city, 5.3 percent, than statewide.

“While good progress is being made, there’s always work to do, especially with dropouts,” Cannon said. “We want no dropouts.”

This is the first time the state has calculated a longitudinal dropout rate, which tracks students over the four years they are expected to attend high school. Previously, the dropout rate was an annual rate, determined by the number of students who permanently left school without receiving a diploma or certificate of completion during a particular year.

Charlottesville was one of four localities in the region to have a dropout rate higher than the state average. It was joined by Buckingham, Greene and Orange counties.

Nelson County, at 4.3 percent, had the lowest number for the area.

Charlottesville and Albemarle’s on-time graduation rates — applying to students who earned a diploma in four years — were 74.6 percent and 87.7 percent, respectively. The state on-time graduation rate was pegged at 82.1 percent.

Completion rates for the localities were higher, mimicking the overall state trend. In Charlottesville, 80.3 percent of the division’s students who entered high school in 2004 have completed their secondary education, and 91.4 percent of Albemarle’s students have done the same.

City Mayor Dave Norris said that anecdotally, he has heard that many students in Charlottesville’s school division do not even make it to the high school. He said he is interested to know dropout rates beginning in seventh grade.

“At least this is a step in the right direction,” Norris said.