Jan. 25—CHEYENNE — Laramie County School District 1 came in four percentage points below the statewide 2023 average graduation rate, the lowest rate that Wyoming’s largest K-12 school district has seen in eight years.

The Wyoming Department of Education released its report on graduation rates for the Class of 2023 on Thursday, and both of Laramie County’s school districts saw a slight dip in their percentages.

Out of 1,080 four-year high school seniors in LCSD1, 77.4% graduated in 2023, according to the report. This is the second-lowest graduation rate the school district has experienced since 2015, when 75.5% of 974 four-year high school grads received their diploma. Last year’s rate was 80.1%.

LCSD1 Assistant Superintendent of Instruction Jim Fraley said that seniors in the 2023 high school graduating class were freshmen when the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic hit in March of 2020. This was an outlying factor that didn’t affect previous graduating classes, he added.

“By the end of their freshman year … school stopped,” Fraley said.

Some students chose to drop out of high school and work in the community, he said. The small percentage that did drop out during the pandemic are already working on obtaining their GED, Fraley added.

“Life happened to them, and they were struggling. High school had to be put on pause,” Fraley said. “My message to them would be ‘keep on keeping on.'”

Among Cheyenne’s three traditional high schools, Central had the highest graduation rate at 89.3%, while East had an 82.6% rate and South saw 71.2% of its expected cohort earn a diploma. The graduation rate was 34.8% at the alternative school, Triumph High, and 100% at the charter school, PODER Academy Secondary School.

At the end of the 2021-22 school year, Central’s graduation rate was 93.4%, East’s was 84.9%, and South’s was 74%, all of which were higher than 2023. That year, Triumph’s graduation rate was 43%, and PODER was at 100%.

Laramie County School District 2 also saw a slight dip in its high school graduation rate, going from 93.3% in 2022 to 89.5% in 2023.

LCSD1 has a much larger high school population than its sister district — out of five high schools, three are traditional, one is an alternative and the fifth is a charter school.

LCSD2 is home to two junior/senior high schools, Pine Bluffs and Burns. The 2023 graduation rate for all four-year students in Burns was 94.2%, compared with 93.2% the year before. In Pine Bluffs, the most recent graduation rate was 82.4%, compared to 93.5% a year earlier.

LCSD2 Superintendent Justin Pierantoni attributed his district’s graduation rate partly to its smaller class size.

“Our size is definitely something we can’t dismiss,” Pierantoni told the Wyoming Tribune Eagle on Thursday. “Our graduating classes have the opportunity to make great connections with staff and their peers.”

Both Laramie County superintendents said they were investing more in technology and mental health services for their students going forward.

The overall statewide graduation rate saw a slight decrease from the previous year, going from 81.8% in 2022 to 81.4% in 2023. However, Wyoming high school graduation rates have remained at 80% or above since 2016.

The WDE’s method of calculating the rate of high school graduates involves dividing the number of on-time graduates by the number of expected on-time graduates. The report comes out every year as federally mandated under the Every Student Succeeds Act.

The formula and methodology used by the department are on track with the set standards in the “Graduation Counts Compact” by the National Governors Association. The report also includes graduation rates for five- and six-year high school graduates.

Hannah Shields is the Wyoming Tribune Eagle’s state government reporter. She can be reached at 307-633-3167 or hshields@wyomingnews.com. You can follow her on X @happyfeet004.