New Study Adds to Evidence That Too Many Americans Do Not Finish High School (1/2)

A new report says only about half of all students in the main school systems of America's largest cities finish high school.  The report notes higher rates of graduation – more than seventy percent -- in areas surrounding the cities. 

The Editorial Projects in Education Research Center prepared the report. 

Researchers studied high school graduation rates from the two thousand three, two thousand four school year.  They also identified the nation's fifty largest cities.  The largest, New York City, had a population of more than eight million.  The smallest city was Wichita, Kansas.  It had about three hundred sixty thousand people.

Researchers used a system of measurement called the cumulative promotion index to find graduation rates.  School officials in many of the cities studied say the resulting numbers were too low.  That is because different areas use different methods to find graduation rates.  Critics say many methods do not give a true picture of the number of students who leave high school before finishing.

参考译文：

一则新报导称美国大城市的主要教育系统中大约只有一半的学生能高中毕业。该报导还指出在这些城市的周边地区，毕业率要高些，超过70%。

教育编辑计划研究中心进行了该项目的研究。

 研究员研究了2003和2004教学年中的高中毕业率。他们也确定了美国50个大城市。最大的城市是纽约，人口超过8百万。最小的城市是堪萨斯州威奇托，人口约为36万。

研究人员采用“累计进级指数”的测量系统来计算高中毕业率。许多被调查城市中的学校官员说所获得的结果数值非常低。这是因为不同的地区使用不同的方法计算高中毕业率。评论家说，许多方法并不能真正反映出那些在高中毕业前就离开学校的学生数目。

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