Where you go to college could determine how successful you are. Not only because those with advanced degrees are progressively less likely to be unemployed, but because data shows students from particular high school graduating classes will graduate at different rates from different colleges.

Newberg High School AP teacher and smaller learning communities project director Doug Geygan has been pouring over data recently received from the National Student Clearinghouse.

He hopes to eventually organize it as finely as shown at a recent national conference where an urban district from the Midwest had determined the graduation rate of its students from different colleges and found wildly different degrees of success.

That data, Geygan said, could be used in the future by counselors to show students where their peers have been successful. “You need to look at which college you’re applying to and what their graduation rates are,” he said. Students can then consider the question: “Is this a good fit for me academically?”

In the past, Geygan said, students were surveyed about their college choice shortly before graduating and that was the end of it. Data collected by the school didn’t account for students who didn’t register until the second term or semester, or who attended and then dropped out.

The new data system keeps track of students for six years after graduation, as they move on, drop out, graduate, or transfer colleges. Of NHS’s 2009 graduates, 53 percent enrolled in college directly after high school. But when students who delayed enrollment are taken into account, the college attendance rate for that class climbs to 61 percent.

Total college enrollment for Newberg grads hovers around 50 percent. From 2004 to 2009, the average was 48 percent, with college-bound students choosing public schools at a rate of nearly two to one. The top five schools attended by Newberg graduates reflected that trend: Portland Community College is on top, followed by Oregon State University, Chemeketa Community College, George Fox University and University of Oregon.

Of the class of 2004, 31 percent now hold a degree, which Geygan said is on par with the national average.

This spring, Geygan intends to survey the entire class of 2010 to gauge how successful they’ve been in higher education. Among the questions he’ll seek answers for is: “Did we adequately prepare them to take college-level English or did they have to take a remedial class?” The same analysis will be made for the rest of the core instruction.

“This is a free service in the state of Oregon,” Geygan said, yet, “not all districts use this.” He would like to know how Newberg stacks up against neighbors. “I would like to know how well we’re doing compared to other schools.”

Story by Laurent Bonczijk, Newberg Graphic