Town of Arlington, Fair Housing Action Plan (July 2021)

Citation: Town of Arlington, Fair Housing Action Plan (July 2021)
Jurisdiction: Arlington (municipal)
Source: Official source
Original Source: https://www.arlingtonma.gov/home/showpublisheddocument/57214/637641171662530000 ↗

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Graduation Rates
The Arlington Public School District’s 2018 graduation rate was 93%, which puts Arlington in the high end of the
comparison municipalities, where graduation rates range from 59% to 98%. Though many factors outside school
quality impact graduation rates, the higher graduation rate means that students in Arlington have the advantage
of participating in a school system where their graduation is extremely likely.
This advantage, however, is not equally conveyed. The graduation rates for Black and Latino students in
Arlington are lower than the overall graduation rate, at 75% and 88% respectively. The same is true for low-
income students, where the graduation rate is 82%. These lower rates, while unacceptable, do reflect trends
across the comparison region: Arlington falls in the middle of the municipalities for Latino and low-income student
graduation rates. The Black student graduation rate in Arlington, however, is the second lowest in the region
(75%), with the caveat of a small sample size; the cohort size for 2018 was 16 students (MA DESE).
As a mid-sized town, Arlington has a single school district with one sixth grade school, one seventh and eighth
grade school, and one high school. Because of this, there are few disparities with regards to which school children
in Arlington attend, regardless of protected class status. However, the differing graduation rates indicate that
there are factors beyond simply attending a high-performing school that contribute to educational attainment.
While these may relate to housing (for example, evictions or overcrowding can negatively impact school
performance), there are so many other structural factors that may contribute to these numbers that it is impossible
to draw conclusions from a housing perspective alone.