(Austin Statesman) Dropout rates, graduation rates, retention rates, passing rates for standardized tests — the education arena is flush with statistics.
Now, a private foundation in Houston is seeking to cut through the noise and focus attention in Texas on what it considers the single most valuable measure of educational effectiveness: the percentage of eighth-graders at public schools who go on to earn a postsecondary degree or certificate within six years of their expected high school graduation date.
A study commissioned by the foundation, the Houston Endowment, found that only about 1 in 5 eighth-graders earns such a credential