Graduation rates in the Long Beach Unified School District (LBUSD) have increased for the third year in a row, again surpassing state and county rates, according to the district. Students of color in Long Beach schools also outperform their peers countywide and statewide, according to data released this week by the California Department of Education. Six of the school district’s high schools now report graduation rates above 90 percent.
“The overall trend of improvement continues,” said LBUSD Superintendent Christopher J. Steinhauser. “Our students continue to surpass their peers statewide despite the fact that we have a greater percentage of students living in poverty than California does. We also know that we have more work to do. We continually analyze the data by school and demographic subgroups to make sure we’re providing support where it’s needed most.”
Six high schools here posted graduation rates above 90 percent, including the California Academy of Mathematics and Science, along with Avalon, Lakewood, Millikan, Renaissance and Wilson high schools. Cabrillo, Jordan and Poly high schools all reported graduation rates exceeding the state average of 80.8 percent.
LBUSD’s overall graduation rate is 81 percent, up 0.2 percentage points over last year and surpassing both Los Angeles County’s rate of 78 percent and California’s rate of 80.8 percent. Long Beach students outperformed their peers statewide despite greater poverty challenges here. About 68 percent of students in Long Beach qualify for subsidized meals at school, compared to about 59 percent statewide, according to 2013-14 data.
The school district’s African-American and Latino students outperformed their peers at the county and state levels. The African-American graduation rate in LBUSD is 73.7 percent, surpassing California’s rate of 68.1 percent and Los Angeles County’s rate of 67.9 percent for the same racial/ethnic subgroup. LBUSD’s Latino students graduated at a rate of 78.8 percent compared to the state’s 76.4 percent and the county’s 74.8 percent for the same population.
Latinos, African-Americans and whites represent the three largest groups of graduates in LBUSD. At several LBUSD high schools, students of color now outperform their white counterparts in terms of graduation rates, according to the school district. Latinos, who are by far the largest ethnic subgroup in the school district, outperformed their white counterparts at Cabrillo, Lakewood, Millikan and Renaissance high schools. African-American students surpassed their white counterparts at Cabrillo and Renaissance.
Source: LBUSD
