Auditors question district's graduation rate improvements

An audit of the Dallas school district shows no indication that students who had excessive absences actually completed their course work before being allowed to graduate:

Dallas ISD has touted its soaring high school graduation rate, but a new district investigation raises questions about whether some seniors — up to a quarter of the Class of 2013 — should have earned diplomas.

An internal audit found 1,821 of that year’s 7,302 graduates missed too many classes. Yet there’s little documentation to show they made up class time as required by state law.

Graduation rates across the state skyrocketed after the 2007-08 school year, when a Texas law first allowed students to get course credit if they participated in plans designed by their principals to make up for absences. In DISD, just 63 percent of the Class of 2007 graduated, but the rate climbed steadily over the next five years, with diplomas awarded to 84 percent of the Class of 2013.

(Note: It is amazing how often auditors discover things like this.)