When it comes to graduation, Maine should do better

High school graduation season has passed.

Audiences filled with beaming parents, friends and family have watched hundreds of our young people take one of the most important and often hardest-earned steps in life.

Every diploma passed from school official to graduate – often accompanied with a heartfelt handshake or hug – is much more than a singular record of one student’s achievement. It is more than a prize for the long-endured suffering of endless lectures, reams of homework and nail-biting examinations.

Every diploma handed out is a document that many in our communities have had a hand in securing. So while only one name appears on a diploma, each is really a reflection of a long-term group effort. One well worth it.

Study upon study shows those completing the rigors of the education a diploma represents ultimately have better lives. They earn more money, usually avoid time behind bars and even end up healthier people.

For others a diploma is a threshold to the next level of learning – a doorway to college, graduate school and beyond.

Still, as of 2005 only 76 percent of all students entering Maine high schools graduate within four years, according to data compiled by the United Health Foundation, a nonprofit that annually measures graduation rates nationwide.

Maine’s high school graduation rate ranks among the top in the nation – 13 of 50, to be precise.

Mainers can be pleased with that rate and ranking, but should not be satisfied with it. For every 100 students entering our public high schools, 24 will not find success there.

It’s true we are doing better than all our New England neighbors except Vermont, ranked No. 8.

But we are also behind New Jersey, North Dakota, Iowa, Utah, Minnesota, Nebraska, Wisconsin, South Dakota, Montana, Idaho and Pennsylvania.

Some will argue graduation statistics, like all statistics, can be skewed this way or that. For instance, we don’t know that all those who enter high school here but don’t finish here don’t graduate in another state – perhaps New Jersey.

Others will also say the demands upon students in states ranked above us may not be as stringent as those placed on Maine students.

Maine has a high ranking, but is it good enough for a state with a Latin motto meaning “I lead”?

We congratulate all our graduates for their hard-won achievement. But we also challenge them and their communities to do all they can to swell the ranks of future graduating classes. Then Maine can truly live up to its motto.