2017 Condition of Education report

Posted by U.S. Department of Education on June 12, 2017

The Condition of Education is a congressionally mandated annual report summarizing important developments and trends in education using the latest available data. The 2017 Condition of Education report presents 50 indicators on topics ranging from prekindergarten through postsecondary education, as well as labor force outcomes and international comparisons. Also included in the report are 4 Spotlight indicators that provide more in-depth analyses on selected topics.

Spotlights:

Risk Factors and Academic Outcomes in Kindergarten Through Third Grade
During the 2010–11 school year, 6 percent of first-time kindergartners had both the risk factor of living in poverty
and the risk factor of not having a parent who completed high school, 2 percent had the single risk factor of not having a parent who completed high school, and 18 percent had the single risk factor of living in poverty. Students who were living in poverty and who did not have a parent who completed high school tended to score lower in reading, mathematics, and science in each of their first four years of school compared to their peers who had neither risk factor at kindergarten entry.

Homeless Children and Youth in Public Schools
In 2014–15, some 2.5 percent of students in U.S. public elementary and secondary schools were reported as homeless children or youth (1.3 million students). This percentage varied from 2.0 percent in suburban school districts to 2.4 percent in rural districts, 2.6 percent in town districts, and 3.7 percent in city districts. The largest numbers of homeless students were enrolled in city (578,000 students) and suburban districts (422,000 students), compared to rural (149,000 students) and town districts (139,000 students).

First-Time Postsecondary Students’ Persistence After 3 Years
Seventy percent of all first-time postsecondary students who began at 2- and 4-year institutions in 2011–12 were still enrolled or had attained a certificate or degree by spring 2014. However, this percentage, also known as a persistence rate, varied by institutional, academic, and student characteristics, including level (2- and 4-year) and control (public, private nonprofit, and private for-profit) of institution, SAT or ACT scores, student age, and race/ethnicity. For example, the persistence rate for students who began at 2-year institutions (57 percent) was 23 percentage points lower than for students who began at 4-year institutions (80 percent). At 4-year institutions, students who were 19 years old or younger when they began had a higher persistence rate (85 percent) than students who were 20 to 23 years old (53 percent), 24 to 29 years old (48 percent), and 30 years old or over (57 percent).

Disability Rates and Employment Status by Educational Attainment
About 16 percent of 25- to 64-year-olds who had not completed high school had one or more disabilities in 2015,
compared to 11 percent of those who had completed high school, 10 percent of those who had completed some college, 8 percent of those who had completed an associate’s degree, 4 percent of those who had completed a bachelor’s degree, and 3 percent of those who had completed a master’s or higher degree. Differences in the employment and not-in-laborforce percentages between persons with and without disabilities were substantial, amounting to about 50 percentage points each. Among those who had obtained higher levels of education, the differences were smaller.

https://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2017144