Graduation/Dropout Rate

The Graduation/Dropout Rate report shows the percent and count of public high school students who, after beginning ninth grade four, five, or six years ago, graduated or dropped out of school. Graduation trends are available starting from the 2006-07 school year.

Students are placed into a cohort year when they are first identified as ninth graders. Students who transfer into the Michigan public education system after ninth grade are placed into the appropriate cohort based on the grade in which the initial district places them. This method tracks individual students who stay in school for up to six years to earn a diploma and helps districts account for students who are retained in a grade, who drop out and return later, or who transfer in/out of a district or the public school system.

Example: Students in the 2018 cohort were ninth graders in the 2014-15 school year. Their on-time expected graduation was four years later (2018). Students in this cohort who graduated in 2018 were counted in the four-year graduation rate; those who did not graduate in 2018 could be counted as dropouts or off-track continuing. Five- and six-year rates are calculated the same way, counting those who graduated with a regular high school diploma within five and six years, respectively.

Exception: Students participating in an early middle college program have five years to complete high school with a regular diploma and an associate degree, 60 transferable college credits, or other advanced certificate, to be considered “On-Track Graduated.” EMC students who complete only a high school diploma in five years will be considered “Off-Track Graduated.”

Four-year graduation rates are an important school accountability measure adopted by the state and aligned with the National Governors Association Graduation Counts Compact.

This report is updated annually every February/March. Historical reports are located in the Data Files section of MI School Data. See the Recently Posted Reports page for when the report was last updated.

Historical Changes

Cross-tabulated subgroup data was added to this report beginning with school year 2017-18. Early Middle College, foster care and military connected subgroups were also added beginning with this year.

Use the Location and Report Settings to review graduation and dropout rates by different categories such as school year and rate year (4-year, 5-year or 6-year rates). Data can also be filtered by categories such as race/ethnicity, gender, economically disadvantaged, English learners, homeless, migrant, foster care, Early Middle College, military connected and students with disabilities.

Crosstab comparisons are also available for some categories. (See Location and Comparison Options, below.)

Data view options include:

• Snapshot (a graph and table of the selected data)
• Trend (a graph and table showing changes over time)
• Entity Breakdown (a table shows the data for the selected entity and related entities; if you’ve selected a particular district, the Entity Breakdown would show data for that district, ISD and individual buildings within the district)

See the MI School Data Quick Start Guide for the basics of navigating the site and customizing a report.

Location Options

These options can be customized in the Location and Report Settings.

Locations Setting options: Statewide, ISD, District and School

Crosstab comparison options include:

• Economically Disadvantaged crossed with:
  • All Students
  • English Learners
  • Gender
  • Race/Ethnicity
• English Learner crossed with:
  • All Students
  • Gender
  • Race/Ethnicity
• Race/Ethnicity crossed with:
  • All Students
  • Gender
• Students With Disabilities crossed with:
  • Economically Disadvantaged
  • English Learners
  • Gender
  • Race/Ethnicity
• Students Without Disabilities crossed with:
  • Economically Disadvantaged
  • English Learners
  • Gender
  • Race/Ethnicity

Logged-in Users

Users with secure access who are logged in have an additional data view option: Student Breakdown. This view provides a list of individual students with name, unique identification code, graduation status, and demographic information. The list can be sorted and filtered by any of these columns.

Only logged-in users can see individual-level data, and only for the entities for which they have been specifically authorized.

CEPI collected the data used to compile this report. The databases used include:

• The Michigan Student Data System to locate the student’s high school building, district, and intermediate school district, as well as grade (used to calculate the expected high school graduation year), exit status, demographics, and subgroup information.
• The Graduation and Dropout Application using audit findings submitted by ISD auditors during the exit status audit period to update a student’s graduation status.

For more details on the data definitions and how the data is collected, please refer to the documentation on CEPI’s Michigan Cohort Graduation and Dropout Reports web page.

The Grad/Dropout Rate report contains data collected from each public school district, including public school academies (charter schools).

Each student is assigned to a graduation cohort the first time they are reported as a ninth grader, or, if a transfer student, immediately upon being reported as enrolled in a high school grade.

Students are included in district rates if they’ve been reported for at least one count day, based on fall and spring counts. If students have not been in the district for at least one count day, they’re only included in the state-level rates. To be included in building rates, students must have been reported to the state for two or more count days.

Students who transferred out of state, to a private school, or who began home schooling aren’t included in the data. Buildings that exclusively serve court-placed students as defined by Title I, Part D have a building-level graduation/dropout rate, but are not included in the district rate.

Some districts may have “N/A” for both the graduation and the drop rate. These districts do not graduate students, so they do not have graduation or drop counts. They’ve been included in the report to ensure records for graduating buildings within the non-graduating district are included.

If you have questions not addressed here or in the linked resources, please contact CEPI customer support at cepi@michigan.gov.

Disclosure Avoidance

To protect the privacy of individual students, CEPI applies data suppression rules to sensitive data when report settings would yield fewer than 10 students in a given group. Complementary groups may also be suppressed. In some cases, values less than 10 may be shown when there is no risk of identifying individual students. Secure users can log in to view unsuppressed data for their authorized location. Please see How CEPI Protects Education Data for more information.

Report Labels

See the glossary for additional terms and acronyms used on MI School Data.

4-year rate year: Total number of students who completed high school with a regular diploma in four years or less; or if enrolled in an early/middle college, completed high school with a regular diploma AND an associate degree or other advanced certificate in five years or less.

5-year rate year: Total number of students who completed high school with a regular diploma in five years or less; or if enrolled in an early/middle college, completed high school with a regular diploma AND an associate degree or other advanced certificate in six years or less.

6-year rate year: Total number of students who completed high school with a regular diploma in six years or less.

Cohort Graduation Year: The year in which a cohort group would be expected to graduate high school (four years after enrolling in ninth grade).

Dropout Rate: The percentage, calculated as Dropouts divided by the Cohort, of the total number of students who left high school permanently at any time during the 4-, 5- or 6-year period (depending on which rate year is being reviewed), or whose whereabouts are unknown.

Dropouts: Total number of students who left high school permanently at any time during the 4-, 5- or 6-year period (depending on which rate year is being reviewed) or whose whereabouts are unknown (Missing Expected Record - MER).

Early Middle College: Students who participated in an early middle college program and were reported with participation code “3500” in the MSDS. This group has five years to complete high school with a regular diploma and an associate degree, 60 transferrable college credits, or other advanced certificate, to be considered “On Track Graduated.” The four-year rates setting in the Graduation/Dropout report on MI School Data reflects the outcome of this subgroup after five years in the program. For the calculation of four-year graduation rates, students in the EMC adjusted cohort year (their fifth year of high school) who only complete the high school diploma portion of their EMC program will be considered “Off-Track Continuing,” but will be included in future five-year and six-year rates as “Off-Track Graduated.”

Graduation Rate: The percentage, calculated as Graduated divided by the Cohort, of the total number of students who completed high school with a regular diploma in 4, 5 or 6 years (depending on which rate year is being reviewed) or less.

Off-Track Continuing: Total number of students who did not complete high school in 4, 5 or 6 years (depending on which rate year is being reviewed) and are still continuing in school.

Other Completer (GED, etc.): Total number of students who earned a GED or other certificate or reached special education maximum age.

Total Cohort: The total number of students who were enrolled as first-time ninth graders in a given year, adjusted for transfers in and transfers out.

Total Graduated: Total number of students who completed high school with a regular diploma during the 4-, 5-, or 6-year period (depending on which rate year is displayed in the report).

Data Calculations

Graduation Rate = Total Graduated / Total Cohort

Dropout = Dropouts / Total Cohort