How many American students are actually earning a high school diploma? The answer depends on who's crunching the numbers. Some say 70 percent, others say it's closer to 83 percent, while the U.S. Census reports that it's 75 percent. The differences are even greater between what some states report and other analysts calculate, a difference that can be more than 20 percentage points.

These guides to high school graduation explain why the experts disagree, show how to interpret the numbers that are out there, and describe what you can do at the local level to calculate accurate and reliable graduation rates so that your community can focus on making sure all students leave high school with a diploma.

At-a-glance: The straight story on high school graduation rates:  A summary of key points to keep in mind when examining high school graduation rates.

High school graduation rates: What do they mean and what can we do? A step-by-step guide to understanding various ways of calculating high school graduation rates and recommendations for things districts can do to collect, analyze and report graduation rates that tell the whole story about high school completion in your community.