Despite a second-place ranking in total high school graduation rates, the state of Wisconsin placed last out of 38 states in the graduation of African American students according to a report released Tuesday.
The study was conducted for the Black Alliance for Educational Options, a Washington, D.C., based company of which Kaleem Caire, a UW-Madison graduate, is president and chief executive officer.
Caire, a Madison-native who attended Madison West High School, said he was not surprised to find Wisconsin's low ranking.
\Wisconsin's a very white state. It has a tradition that does not like to consider the traditions of African Americans,"" he said. ""I think that it's gotten better, but you don't find a lot of African Americans in positions of leadership in this state.""
Caire said he had attended a forum in 1997 held by the UW System addressing Plan 2008, an initiative to increase diversity at UW System schools.
""I said 'You guys are talking about recruiting students of color [to college]. We aren't even graduating enough students of color [from high schools] around the state to have any kind of impact on diversity numbers on our campuses,"" he said.
In 1999, UW System officials instituted Precollege Enrichment Opportunity Program for Learning Excellence, a program to recruit minority students from inner-city schools in Beloit, Milwaukee and Racine public school districts.
UW-Madison Senior Administrative Program Specialist Ruby Paredes said she expected PEOPLE to lead to ""quite an increase"" of students from inner-city schools.
""We're hoping that this is the kind of program that will prepare the students for admission here and for success on campus,"" she said.
Caire said he thought there was a direct correlation between low high school graduation rates and the level of diversity at UW-Madison.
""There are all these issues that, to the UW System's credit, [it has] been trying to tackle,"" he said. ""But they're never going to be really successful until they develop some symmetry between them and the K-12 system.""
Among the 50 largest school districts in the country, Cleveland City, Cleveland, had the lowest overall graduation rate with 28 percent, followed by Memphis, Tenn., Milwaukee and Columbus, Ohio, according to the study.
Jay Greene of the Manhattan Institute conducted the report by identifying eighth grade enrollment for each jurisdiction and subgroup for fall 1993. He then collected the information on the number of regular high school diplomas awarded in spring 1998 when those eighth graders should have been graduating, accounting for the possibility some of the students could have moved.
