Corbis
There’s good news and bad news about our nation’s education system.
The good news is the graduation rate is getting better. According to a new report, there were 261 fewer dropout factories in 2008 than there were in 2002, and the national graduation rate rose to 75% in 2008, from 72% in 2001.
The bad news: The same study says 2.2 million students are still attending dropout factories, and there remains a considerable acheivement gap between white students and African American and Hispanic students. TIME contributor Andrew J. Rothertham has a full analysis here.