The four-year graduation rate, or the percentage of students who graduate within four years of entering high school, is one metric used to look at the success of the District in supporting students toward the goal of high school graduation. In this brief we present Philadelphia public high school graduation rates from 2013-14 to 2023-24 and examine the trends in this metric by different student groupings.

Key findings include:

• High schools across Philadelphia experienced an overall increase in four-year graduation rate from 2022-23 to 2023-24, with some variation between sectors.
  • District school graduation rates increased by 3.4 percentage points (80.8% to 84.2%).
  • Charter school graduation rates increased by 0.9 percentage points (88.2% to 89.1%).
  • Alternative school graduation rates increased by 4.9 percentage points (26.6% to 31.5%).
• District graduation rates across all student demographic groups (race/ethnicity, economic status, EL, IEP) stayed the same or increased from 2022-23 to 2023-24.
  • Economically disadvantaged students in District schools graduated at a rate lower than students who were not economically disadvantaged. But economically disadvantaged students also saw a 2.5 percentage point increase in graduation year over year (81.4% to 83.9%).
• Of the District students who did not graduate by their fourth year of high school in the 2013-14 to 2021-22 target years, 10% graduated within five years, and a total of 12.2% graduated within six years.