There's a staggering number of problems with the data:
1. It is not current. No doubt someone has 2009 data somewhere
2. Who cares what the dropout rate in a state is? Is dropout rate by county
more useful? No, not really. How about by town or even school district?
Well, we are getting warmer. What's really needed is easy access by year and
school with some sort of reason why someone dropped out. It could have
been due to death, illness, economics, leaving for college early ... Or he or
she just felt school was worthless.
3. Hardly anyone ever gets a zero on standardized tests, so we propose
students who drop out be scored as a zero for each year that they normally
would have been in school. A little motivation.
4. Schools cheat like crazy. If a student looks to be headed out, the common
strategy is to transfer him or her. Yes, he'll be a district drop-out but it won't
be charged to the particular school.
5. Many many billions were spent on No Child Left Behind with an emphasis
on high school diplomas. The numbers provide mute testimony the money
was not well spent. We suppose one could argue the numbers would have
been worse without NCLB.
6. The key point is even with all the money, relaxed standards, fudged
data and so on THE NUMBER OF STUDENTS LEAVING SCHOOL IS
DREADFUL.
7. It being an election year again, we will say that the dismal state of
American high schools constitutes a clear and present danger to the
national security of the United States of America.