Cardinal CSD's Grad Rate is 5% Higher Than State Average
posted March 16, 2021
This week, the Iowa Department of Education announced graduation and dropout rates for the 2019-20 school year.
We are proud to find that 97% of Cardinal seniors graduated last year — 5% more than the state average which was 91.8%.
“The graduation data is a testament to everyone working at Cardinal,” Superintendent Joel Pedersen says. “We are pleased with this number but won't stop until we reach a 100% graduation rate.”
In efforts to increase graduation rates, this year we piloted a Career and College Counselor program. In the program, a student is assigned to a counselor with the sole purpose of focusing on a student’s goal for life after graduation. The counselor and student look at what can be done in the present to make that goal a reality. The program will be fully implemented next school year.
“If kids are just going to school to go to school, that’s when you see a lot of dropouts,” High School Principal Landon Miller says. “For us, it’s finding a goal for students to focus on.”
In addition to the Career and College Counselor program, other programs are in place to support students and encourage them to get their diplomas.
“The biggest thing is the flexibility of our staff and the support of the administration,” Mr. Miller says. “The staff works really hard to accommodate where kids are.”
Cardinal’s alternative high school and support center are two resources available for students who need extra help or a different approach to their education. The alternative high school provides students with a flexible schedule and assistance for students who haven’t found success in a typical education environment.
Our success center, our version of study hall, gives students a safe place to get up to speed with assignments and ask for help when needed.
“For us, it’s people, not programs,” Mr. Miller says. “We have a really good success center person who really cares about helping kids recover credits when they fail.”
To reach our goal of a 100% graduation rate, Mr. Miller expects we’ll need to re-evaluate programs to make sure they fit what each new class of kids needs — especially after the pandemic.
“The pandemic has added to students’ struggles with getting through high school so we’ve been cognizant of that,” Mr. Miller explains. “The next frontier is how do we support all these kids that the pandemic has forced to go online or struggled with in poverty and now struggles to get back to form to be successful in school?”
We look forward to finding solutions to these challenges and finding our students the support they need as we work towards a 100% graduation rate.
