TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Florida’s education commissioner announced Wednesday that the state has launched an investigation into whether school districts are moving students around as part of an effort to manipulate graduation rates.
Commissioner Pam Stewart said that late last year the state began taking a closer look at students in 10 counties who were switching to alternative schools in their senior year but now the probe has been expanded statewide. The investigation will look at all students who were in the 12th grade but somehow weren’t included in data used to determine graduation rates.
The disclosure of the investigation is unusual, especially since Florida leaders, including Gov. Rick Scott, have continually touted the state’s rising graduation rates over the past few years. The state’s graduation rate was reported at 80.7 percent for the school year that ended in the summer of 2016. The rate was just over 59 percent in 2004 while Jeb Bush was governor and the state was pushing ahead with sweeping changes that ranked schools based on student performance.
But legislators — and news reports– have begun to question the validity of the data based on some of the practices at school districts. Gary Chartrand, a member of the State Board of Education, said officials need to address what he called a “serious allegation.”
“We want to be sure that we are presenting is an accurate portrayal of the picture of what’s happening in Florida,” Stewart said.
Last fall — prompted by a northeast Florida state legislator — the state asked for responses from 10 counties reporting that at least 10 percent of their students who failed to get a diploma and pass statewide exams had transferred to a private school in their senior year. Many of these students wound up in online alternative charter schools.
Then in February, ProPublica reported that students were being transferred out of an Orlando school into an alternative charter school. The story said students were then listed as being withdrawn and placed into adult education programs.
Stewart said she has asked for a statewide investigation to make sure “we aren’t hurting students in the process” and that students are switching schools in their senior years for legitimate reasons.
“We want to make sure students are making the right choices for the right reasons,” Stewart said.
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