BMHS Principal David Meinschein said the overall rate of 88.3 percent for that year placed the high school in the top 15 percent in the state. “We are fourth in our region, and 35th overall in the whole state of Kentucky,” he added. He said Ballard’s emphasis on individualized instruction, taking each student’s learning style into account, had been instrumental in the increases. 

Kentucky has moved to calculating an Averaged Freshman Graduation Rate (AFGR), instead of a simple percentage of high-school seniors who start school in the fall, and receive their diplomas the following spring.

The AFGR formula divides the average of prior years’ ninth- and 10th-grade enrollment by the number of four-year diploma and more-than-four-year diploma recipients in the current reporting year. Students with disabilities whose Individual Education Plans enable them to take more than four years to obtain a diploma are included in this calculation.

Ballard’s AFGRs are as follows:

For 2010-11: Total-88.3; Males-86.0; Females-90.4; White-84.7
For 2009-10: Total-86.5; Males-90.7; Females-82.0; White-85.4
For 2008-09: Total-83.1; Males-87.8; Females-77.6; White-80.7
For 2007-08: Total-77.3; Males-74.0; Females-81.6; White-78.5

Ballard does not have information collected for separate minority groups because the percentages of each group here are so small.

The statewide Averaged Freshman Graduation Rate (AFGR) for the 2010-11 school year was 78 percent, an increase from 2009-10’s 76.7 percent. AFGRs for males, females and all but one ethnic group also improved.

Complete details on district and school graduation rates can be found in the Open House section of KDE’s website or by clicking on the item under “Headlines” on the agency’s home page at http://www.education.ky.gov/KDE/.