American Public High Schools
High school students in the United States have a few choices when it comes to what type of school they attend. These include being homeschooled, going to a private school, going to a public charter school or going to a public high school. With these different types of schools come different educational formats, but the core lessons are the same nationwide. High school consists of grades 10 through 12, and includes ninth grade in most cases.
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Funding
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American public high schools get their funding from many different sources. These sources include federal, state and local funding. State funding amounted to 48 percent of public school funding in the 2006/2007 school year. Local funding accounted for the second most amount of funding for public schools in comparison to other sources of funding in the 2006/2007 school year. Federal funding came in last for public school funding, accounting for only eight percent of the funding. What isn't funded for by state, local and federal sources, like extra field trips and some supplies, are expected to be paid for by parents.
Enrollment
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According to the National Center for Education Statistics, in the 2006/2007 school year, 15.1 million students were enrolled in ninth through twelfth grade in public high schools. There weren't always this many students in public high schools. In fact, there was a serious decrease in enrollment of grades nine through 12 in the late 1970s through the 1980s. An increase in enrollment in public high schools started in 1990 and went through 2008. A decline in enrollment is supposed to occur between 2008 and 2012. However, an increase is projected to occur in public high school enrollment from 2012 through 2020.
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Charter Schools
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Public charter high schools are not considered private schools, although they are exempt from some regulations or rules that other public schools must follow. Charter schools are exempt from these rules because they are governed by a contracted group or organization. This contract is called a charter. Charter schools all have different organizations chartering them, different demographics of students and different origins from each other.
Graduation Rates
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According to responses collected from administrators for the National Center for Education Statistics, in the 2007/2008 school year, 83 percent of twelfth graders in public high schools graduated. This was a decreased percentage from the 1999/2000 school year, where 89 percent of public high school seniors graduated. Although there was a decrease in graduation, there was an increase in students going on to attend college. An estimated 40 percent, up from 37 percent, went to four-year universities after the 2007/2008 school year. Low-poverty public high schools had a 91 percent graduation rate for the 2007/2008 school year, with 52 percent of the graduates going on to study at a four-year university. High-poverty public high schools had a 68 percent graduation rate with only 28 percent of graduated students enrolling in a four-year university in the same school year.
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References
- National Center for Education Statistics: Public School Revenue Sources
- National Center for Education Statistics: Public School Enrollment
- National Center for Education Statistics:Profile and Demographic Characteristics of Public Charter Schools
- National Center for Education Statistics: Characteristics of Public Schools
Resources
- Photo Credit A High-School Graduate image by TMLP from Fotolia.com
