The Every Student Counts Act seeks to hold high schools responsible for graduating students by improving the calculation of and accountability for high school graduation rates. Specifically, the legislation requires states, schools, and districts to use a common, accurate, graduation rate calculation.

By using a cumulative graduation rate calculation, the bill also gives schools credit for graduating students who may take longer than the typical four years to graduate with a regular diploma. This calculation creates incentives for schools, districts, and states to create programs to serve students who have already dropped out and are over-age and undercredited.

The bill would also require high schools with graduation rates of less than 90 percent to make aggressive but attainable increases in their graduation rates as part of the annual accountability requirements under the No Child Left Behind Act. To ensure that schools are held accountable for the graduation of all students, this requirement applies to both the overall graduation rate and the graduation rate of each subgroup of students.

The Every Student Counts Act creates a graduation rate calculation that is consistent across states, requiring reporting of subgroup graduation rates, setting meaningful graduation rate goals and targets, and removing incentives for schools to push out low-performing and at-risk students. 

The Every Student Counts Act would do the following:

• Make graduation rate calculations uniform and accurate. The bill would require that all states calculate their graduation rates in the same manner, allowing for more consistency and transparency.
• Set meaningful graduation rate goals and growth targets for all students. The bill sets a graduation rate goal of 90 percent for all students and disadvantaged populations. Schools, districts and States with graduation rates below 90 percent, in the aggregate or for any subgroup, must increase their graduation rates an average of 3 percentage points per year to make AYP.
• Balance testing and graduation rates for accountability purposes. The bill would ensure that test scores and graduation rates are weighted equally when determining AYP so that schools have balanced incentives to both graduate their students and raise their test scores instead of doing one at the expense of the other.
• Recognize that some small numbers of students take longer than four years to graduate. Instead of treating certain students differently for accountability purposes and predetermining when certain students would graduate, the Every Student Counts Act includes a cumulative graduation rate provision. Under this provision, schools, school districts and states would be given credit for graduating students who may take longer than the typical four years when they graduate with a regular diploma. Providing for a cumulative rate also creates incentives for schools, districts, and states to create programs to serve students who have already dropped out and are over-age and undercredited. The bill also maintains the primacy of graduating the great preponderance of all students in four years by requiring that at least 90 percent of all graduates be four-year graduates.

About the Every Student Counts Act:

• To learn more about the Senate version of Every Student Counts Act, read the bill summary.

Support for the Every Student Counts Act: Introduced on September 25, 2008 in the Senate, the Every Student Counts Act has garnered support from members of the education community.

• The Alliance for Excellent Education, along with various education, civil rights, and advocacy organizations, released a letter of support at the bill’s introduction.