A national report released last week from Education Week and the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center stated Jeffco Public Schools had the third highest graduation rate in the nation at 85.5 percent.

The study looked at the 50 largest school districts in the nation, and is based on the most recent data analysis, which concerns the graduates from the class of 2009.

Jeffco Superintendent Cindy Stevenson said the district makes an ongoing effort to keep graduation rates up, but it started changing the way it looks at graduation rates after learning about a study from the Center for Social Organization of Schools at Johns Hopkins University in 2007.

The study states there are several points in a students’ education when predictions can be made about whether they will graduate on time.

Jeffco schools use this data to help determine which students may be at risk or need more help.

“I am incredibly proud that our ranking has improved and is even better than before,” Stevenson said in a press release. “To have the third-best graduation rate of the largest school districts is a reflection of the great work being done in our schools to make sure students graduate with choices for their future.”

The Editorial Projects in Education Research Center uses a different formula to calculate graduation rates than Jeffco or the state of Colorado, so the numbers vary among those three groups during the 2009 school year.

According to Jeffco’s count for the class of 2009, the rate was 81.3 percent.

The state changed its method of calculating graduation rates during the 2009-10 school year, Judith Martinez, principal consultant for the Colorado Department of Education’s Office of Dropout Prevention and Student Re-engagement.

Previously the state counted early and late graduates with the current graduating class.

Now, only the four-year “on time” rate is counted. The three-year and five-year rates are counted in a different category.

The research center uses yet another formula to calculate the graduation rate, which Stevenson has caused some fluctuation in the scores.

Still, she said, it is an honor to be ranked third out of 50 of the nation’s largest districts.

“And we were being compared to some really good school districts,” she said.