​With graduation ceremonies happening across the nation this month, we ought to celebrate what graduating from high school accomplishes in the lives of students.

For instance, the “success sequence” is a data-backed set of decisions that says 97% of young people avoid poverty if they graduate from high school, get a full-time job, and marry before having children.

Teaching this information to students is helpful to them in making good choices, but creating public policy that supports students in taking those steps is crucial too.

For those in education or education policy, then, high school graduation is a key metric worth analyzing, both in terms of asking “How are we doing?” and “How can we do better?”

A closer look at graduation rates

Utah’s statewide graduation rate for 2023 was 88.3%, an achievement that follows five years of consistently inching upward. Obviously, individual school districts fare better or worse than the state graduation rate. Why certain districts have higher or lower graduation rates can be difficult to nail down. And finding out exactly how to impact graduation rates is also complex because there is not one specific variable that predicts whether a student will drop out. However, factors like family structure, parent education, disability, attendance, misbehavior or academic problems can all play a role.

Furthermore, parent engagement has impacts on student achievement. Chronic absenteeism can make it difficult for students to keep up and graduate on time. And of course, the personal motivation of students can determine whether they receive their diploma.

District spending and outcomes

Often discussions about improving outcomes for students revert to money. While funding and spending is an important factor in public schools, it’s not clear how and when money translates to specific outcomes, including graduation rates. For some perspective, we looked at student metrics from all 41 public school districts, with special attention given to the 10 districts with the highest per pupil spending amount and the 10 districts with the lowest per pupil spending amount to see how they performed on the state report card and graduation rates.