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WISEdash for Districts High School Completion Dashboards

About the Data | Reporting | Definitions and Formulas | Data Sources | Data Changes | Resources


About the Data

 

A student is assigned to a graduation rate cohort based on two factors:

  1. School year of the student’s first high school enrollment period in Wisconsin, and
  2. Student’s grade level placement at the time of that first high school enrollment period.

To be counted as a graduate under the four-year adjusted cohort rate, a student must earn a regular diploma on or before the summer following their fourth year of high school. This includes early graduates.

To be counted as a completer under the four-year adjusted cohort rate, a student must earn a regular diploma, high school equivalency diploma, or other high school completion credential on or before the summer following their fourth year of high school. This includes early completers.


 

High School Completion Rates: HS Completion Rate metrics are based on the federally-required Title I adjusted cohort rate formula. All students included in the calculation of these rates are part of a statewide cohort. Students are assigned to a statewide cohort when they first enroll in a high school grade. In general, district and school cohorts are determined based on where students in the statewide cohort were last enrolled during the 4, 5, 6 or 7 year timeframe following the creation of the statewide cohort. Four-year, five-year, six-year and seven-year rates are published for the school year toward the end of each timeframe as HS completion data is received, and reflect each student’s completion status as of the end of that school year. Students will appear as non-completers in WISEdash until the HS completion data is successfully submitted and accepted in WISEdata. Once the submitted data is error-free, the student will be reported as a completer.

  • HS Completers – 4 Year Rate. This metric indicates that the percentage of students in the cohort who received any HS completion credential during the 4-year timeframe. Completers include students earning credentials in less than 4 years. The credential categories are “regular diploma”, “HSED” (high school equivalency diploma), and other (e.g. certificates of attendance and completion).
  • HS Completers – 5 Year Rate. This metric indicates that the percentage of students in the cohort who received any HS completion credential during the 5-year timeframe. Completers include students earning credentials in less than 5 years. The credential categories are “regular diploma”, “HSED” (high school equivalency diploma), and other (e.g. certificates of attendance and completion). The 5 Year Rate for Year X includes the same students as the 4 Year Rate for Year X-1 with adjustments made for certain changes in student status between the end of year 4 and end of year 5.
  • HS Completers – 6 Year Rate. This metric indicates that the percentage of students in the cohort who received any HS completion credential during the 6-year timeframe. Completers include students earning credentials in less than 6 years. The credential categories are “regular diploma”, “HSED” (high school equivalency diploma), and other (e.g. certificates of attendance and completion). The 6 Year Rate for Year X includes the same students as the 5 Year Rate for Year X-1 with adjustments made for certain changes in student status between the end of year 5 and end of year 6.
  • HS Completers – 7 Year Rate (new for 2017-18). This metric indicates that the percentage of students in the cohort who received any HS completion credential during the 7-year timeframe. Completers include students earning credentials in less than 7 years. The credential categories are “regular diploma”, “HSED” (high school equivalency diploma), and other (e.g. certificates of attendance and completion). The 7 Year Rate for Year X includes the same students as the 6 Year Rate for Year X-1 with adjustments made for certain changes in student status between the end of year 6 and end of year 7.
  • HS Non-completers – 4 Year Rate. This metric indicates the percentage of students in the cohort who did not earn any HS completion credential during the 4-year timeframe. The categories are “known to be continuing”, “reached maximum age” and “not known to be continuing”.
  • HS Non-completers – 5 Year Rate. This metric indicates the percentage of students in the cohort who did not earn any HS completion credential during the 5-year timeframe. The 5 Year Rate for Year X includes the same students as the 4 Year Rate for Year X-1 with adjustments made for certain changes in student status between the end of year 4 and end of year 5.
  • HS Non-completers – 6 Year Rate. This metric indicates the percentage of students in the cohort who did not earn any HS completion credential during the 6-year timeframe. The 6 Year Rate for Year X includes the same students as the 5 Year Rate for Year X-1 with adjustments made for certain changes in student status between the end of year 5 and end of year 6.
  • HS Non-completers – 7 Year Rate (new for 2017-18). This metric indicates the percentage of students in the cohort who did not earn any HS completion credential during the 7-year timeframe. The 7 Year Rate for Year X includes the same students as the 6 Year Rate for Year X-1 with adjustments made for certain changes in student status between the end of year 6 and end of year 7.

High School Completion Cohorts: This table provides a convenient way to view all the recent active and future cohorts. Users with proper authorization can select a cohort described by any row and view student level details for that cohort. Rate Inclusion Indicators are calculated for each student prior to calculating rates and document exclusion of any student who transferred to another state or nonpublic school, emigrated to another country, or died before the end of the rate timeframe.

  • Past and Current Cohorts. These lists include student level details about all students in the indicated cohort and reporting year. Students in the list with “Rate Inclusion Indicator = Included” are the students in the cohort used for the High School Completion Rates. Rows are also included for students with “Rate Inclusion Indicator=Excluded” so users can understand which students are counted in rates and which are not.
  • Future Cohorts. These lists include all students in the indicated future cohort without regard to reporting year, rate timeframe or rate inclusion status. Note that
    • Future cohorts tend to be larger near the end of the timeframe than at the beginning. This is because the cohort initially consists only of first time 9th graders. With each successive year of the timeframe, students who initially enter the cohort at higher grade levels are added to the cohort. These students generally come from home schools, private schools or from out of state.
    • Rate Inclusion Indicators are not calculated for future cohorts and likely contain some students that will not be included in reporting then the reporting period arrives.

Time to High School Completion: This dashboard shows how many students earned completion credentials in a selected year and how long it took for them to earn those credentials. Time is the number of years since a student was a first time ninth grader until the selected year. For students who entered a statewide cohort after ninth grade, time is the number of years since the statewide cohort was created. Only students who earned completion credentials in the selected year are counted.

Note:

  • For students who initially enrolled in high school before 2006-07, time to high school completion is reported as “Years Unknown” because data about time to completion were not available in ISES until 2006-07. Limited data about time to completion were available between 2006-07 and 2010-11. Complete data were not available until 2011-12.
  • Counts of students who earned completion credentials match those counts used in calculating legacy high school completion rates for the same school year. Due to formula differences, these counts may or may not match counts of completers used in calculating four-year through seven-year rates for the same school year.

Definitions and Formulas

 
  • Definitions of terms used in WISEdash (FOR DISTRICTS) High School Completion dashboards can be found in the WISEdash Glossary for WISEdash Public Portal
  • Formulas used in calculating adjusted cohort rates can be found on the About the Data - High School Completion webpage under Counting Students and Calculating Rates. Although About the Data - High School Completion is designed for use with WISEdash Public Portal, the formulas for calculating adjusted cohort rates are the same as those used in WISEdash (FOR DISTRICTS). There may be very small differences in counts used to calculate rates due to the dynamic nature of data sets used for WISEdash (FOR DISTRICTS).

Data Sources

 

High School Completion Rates and Final Cohorts. All data come from Individual Student Enrollment System (ISES) Year End records and WISEdata.   The key records used for cohorts and rates are typically the ISES/WISEdata record when the student initially enrolls in a high school grade and that student’s most recent ISES/WISEdata record as of the end of his or her cohort’s four-, five-, six- or seven-year rate timeframe.  

Future Cohorts. Students' graduation cohorts are adjusted each night based on new and corrected enrollment data submitted to WISEdata.  Student counts for future cohorts can change significantly as the school year progresses and more complete enrollment data is received. 

Time to High School Completion. All data about high school completion come from ISES Year End/WISEdata records for the selected school year.  All data about time (to high school completion) is based on each student’s first high school enrollment record in ISES/WISEdata regardless of year.


Data Changes Over Time

 

With the implementation of the WISEdata collection system in 2017, graduation cohort determinations are adjusted nightly based on new and corrected incoming data. Previously assigned graduation cohorts based on the ISES collection are not adjusted. Also beginning with 2017, the High School Completion dashboards are available much sooner than in the past. As year-end completion data starts to become available through WISEdata, WISEdash will add the new year of data and update the rates nightly. Certified rates which will be used for reporting will be based on the YE snapshot.


Resources