Superintendent Dance Calls for Higher Black Male Graduation Rate

The Baltimore County Public Schools system has the fourth highest graduation rate for black males in the nation, but that's not good enough for Superintendent S. Dallas Dance.

"Baltimore County schools have traditionally fared well in these national rankings,” Dance announced in response to the recently released national study. 

"But how we rate among school systems isn’t where our attention needs to be. Having just 67 percent of our black males graduate is not acceptable. We must set our sights higher. We must do more to guarantee that black male students— that all students—can achieve their full potential as learners, and that they graduate on time and ready to succeed in their choice of college or career," Dance stated in a news release.

The report from Schott Foundation for Public Education notes that nationally, as of the 2009-2010 school year—the most recently available data—only 52 percent of black males graduate from high school in four years. The study states that this figure is 10 percent higher than the 2001-2002 school year.

Baltimore County trailed behind Montgomery County; Newark, New Jersey and Cumberland County, North Carolina among districts with more than 10,000 black male graduates. On the other side of the spectrum, Rochester, New York ranked as having the lowest rate with nine percent.

As a state, Maryland was five percentage points above the national average at 57 percent.

New York has a 39 percent rate of black male graduates, the lowest in the nation, according to the report. Maine claimed the highest rate with 97 percent.