Hopefully by now everyone knows that a high school degree is one of the most important goals young people can achieve. If we can offer just one reason for that: you’ve got to have one before you can get to work on that college degree! Also, high school graduates are going to have lifetime earnings higher than high school dropouts, just as college graduates will earn more over their lifetimes than those with just the high school diploma. Mamas, (papas too) don’t let your babies grow up to be dropouts.
The good news is that in 2012, overall nationwide about 80 percent of students now graduate from high school. There are still lots of differences in the graduation rates of different student populations. Overall, girls win the battle of the sexes with an 84 percent graduation rate, while boys, their minds elsewhere, are around 77 percent.
What about other subgroups? Asian-American students have the highest graduation rate at 86 percent, two points higher than white students. African-American students graduated at a rate of 69 percent, behind Hispanic students at 73. Some states do better than others at getting young people into caps and gowns. And some states do better at getting minorities to the finish line.
What states do the best job of getting high school diplomas into the hands of their African-American students? Some of the top ten states may surprise you and, spoiler alert, Georgia’s not in the top ten. Also remember that some states have pretty small African-American populations. Tied for the number ten spot, a little less than 5 percent of Arizona’s population is African-American versus South Carolina’s almost 30 percent.
Check out our gallery for the states that graduate the most black students.
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