NJ Spotlight reports that the NJ DOE is way past its self-imposed February deadline to release high school graduation rates. Collateral damage is the NJ State Report Cards, which are usually available to the public at this point. The problem? We have historically inflated graduation rates and now our data system, NJ SMART, is supposed to bring a necessary degree of due diligence to the process.

Notes Spotlight,

Under the old system, New Jersey has the highest graduation rate in the country at about 87 percent, the exact rate depending on the measure.

Officials said they expected to have the new graduation results finished in the next month, but they said it has been a complicated and labor-intensive process involving the input of data student by student, some of it going back four years.

Ordered by the federal government, New Jersey’s data system — dubbed NJ SMART — follows individual students on a statewide basis, tracking where they come and go during the course of their four years in high school. Officials said once tabulated, it will likely bring down New Jersey’s best-in-the-nation rates from previous district-reported ones.

This is not a new problem. Remember back in August 2010, when we received our thumbs-down from the federal reviewers of our Race To The Top application and then-Ed. Comm. Bret Schundler fell on his sword about a minor editing problem? The rejection of our application had little to do with the five-pointer and a lot to do with other issues, like inflated graduation rates and lack of open access to high-performing schools. Anyway, as we continue our trip down memory lane and wait for the DOE to get its act together, here’s what two federal reviewers said in 2010 about our graduation rates:

Reviewer #1:“Increasing the graduation rate may initially prove more difficult as the state has been inflating it and nearly one-third of LEA’s did not sign on to support this goal.”

Reviewer #4:“New Jersey acknowledges that its historical graduation rate data is unrealistically inflated and has plans to implement a new tracking system soon. Some available data shows low graduation rates for Hispanic and African-American students. There is no evidence that graduation rates have improved.”