LAKE COUNTY, Fla. – It’s not just high school seniors celebrating graduation in Lake County this year.
Lake County Schools is above the state’s average when it comes to graduation rates for the 2023-2024 school year.
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“We say that we’re going to ensure that every student graduates ready to enter college, enter the workforce, and we have to remain committed to that,” said Lake County Superintendent Diane Kornegay.
Back in 2017, Superintendent Diane Kornegay said the district’s graduation rate was sitting around 77%.
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According to the Lake County Schools, the graduation rate for district-operated schools for the 2023-2024 school year came in at 93%.
For all Lake County Public Schools, including charter schools, that number was at 91.7% according to the Florida Department of Education.
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However, both graduation rates surpass the state’s average which was at 89.7% for the 2023-2024 school year.
“We knew that we had the right people in the right places and the right systems and structures in place,” Kornegay said. “It really is just that intensive focus, student by student, that our high schools are doing such a tremendous job with.”
Kornegay said back in 2017 when she stepped into the superintendent role they created the graduation facilitator position at each high school to make sure students stay on track for graduation as soon as they enter ninth grade.
“If they [students] are not, they are proficient in making sure they intervene through a variety of opportunities,” Kornegay said. “We have intervention programs at every high school. We actually have something else that’s really innovative, and that’s a night school program for students that are just not finding success during the school day and they may need more time and support for learning.”
While most schools saw an increase, Eustis High School did see a dip. The school dropped from 91 percent in the 2022-2023 school year to 86% for 2023-2024.
“We pushed in some district administrators that went in and helped to make sure that their systems and structures are in place to make sure every student is graduating within their cohort,” Kornegay said.
District officials told us they feel pretty confident that based on the work happening at Eustis High School, they will be back at 90%.
Kornegay said at the end of the day, its a team effort to make sure their students graduate.
“I’m just so proud of the work that’s happening to ensure that every year our graduation rate goes up,” Kornegay said. “And as more and more students come in, we’re still having more and more students cross the graduation stage.”