Marion County’s high school graduation rate of 80.3% for the 2023-2024 school year increased from its 77.9% rate for the 2022-2023 school year, according to a report released in January.
Before the increase, Marion County’s high school graduation rates had steadily declined from the 2019-2020 to the 2022-2023 school year.
Principals in the county have poured more attention and resources into keeping up with the momentum of graduation rates in Florida.
Few have spent more time in a Marion County public school than Forest High School’s principal, Lamar Rembert, whose school’s graduation rate went from 86% in 2023 to 91% in 2024.
He graduated from Belleview High School almost 26 years ago. While taking a semester off from college, he moved back to Marion County where he started coaching high school football and working as a substitute teacher to earn extra money.
“I got hooked with the experience that I was having,” he said. “My mother’s a 35-year educator and at the time she encouraged me to pursue it because she saw I had a passion for it.”
Rembert’s career has taken him through almost all levels of education. After starting his career as a physical education teacher, he became a dean of students at the elementary level before becoming an assistant principal at Madison Street Elementary School — the same one he attended when he was younger.
Now having been principal of Forest High School for three years, Rembert said the main ingredient for increasing a school’s graduation rate is teamwork.
“It’s very much a team approach here at Forest High School,” he said. “[That goes for] my peers’ schools, too.”
West Port High School’s graduation rate has also increased recently, shifting from about 84% in the 2022-2023 school year to about 89% in the 2023-2024 school year. The school’s principal, Ginger Cruze, said that a greater focus on teaching bolstered the increase.
“We really focused on… strong instruction,” she said. “Get the students here, get them to enjoy coming to school, and it just pushes their success much higher.”
West Port High School’s increased graduation rate wasn’t always the case. Its graduation rate was near 90% before it declined to 84% for the 2022-2023 school year.
“I hate to say the word COVID, but that did have a lot to do with that,” Cruze said. “We had students that ended up leaving, students that went online and students that have dropped out.”
In the face of adversity, Cruze and her administrators had to act quickly to get their students back on the right path. She highlighted West Port High’s credit recovery lab, which allowed students to recover missing credits in order to graduate.
Cruze considers fast state exam scoring as a key factor in rising graduation rates. Students now receive their results almost immediately after taking their exams, which allows teachers and administrators to work with students right away to improve in necessary areas.
To Rembert, another key factor for Forest High’s increased graduation rates was goal setting. This was achieved by ensuring students could track their class progress from the moment they set foot in school, he said.
“From the time students are freshmen to the time they’re seniors, our guidance counselors are keeping spreadsheets to tracks students’ tests scores, GPAs and credits earned to make sure they do what they need to get done,” he said.
Rembert emphasized that Forest High’s approach to student success centers around ensuring students feel supported by teachers and administrators.
Cruze echoed that sentiment when describing her team’s approach to maximizing student success.
“Perseverance, where we continue to push,” she said. “We just don’t accept that these kids don’t graduate.”
Still, some students can’t cross the finish line.
Rembert knows that. It fuels his fire to encourage those students to seek alternative routes to make sure they’re as successful as possible when they reach adulthood, but it doesn’t make the feeling easier to stomach, he said.
“Obviously, our graduation rate wasn’t 100%, so there’s some we lost along the way,” he said. “That’s equally hurtful as the pride I have for the ones that do finish.”
Rembert maintained that people like his school’s graduation coordinator make the quest to see every student in any given graduation class receive their diploma much easier. It’s a testament to the teamwork-oriented mindset he and his team of administrators and faculty share, he said.
To Cruze, graduation day is a moment of reflection.
“To see that senior that maybe struggled in ninth grade and had some bad behavior maybe in tenth then walk across and has an honor cord around neck… it makes a big difference,” she said.
For Rembert, graduation ceremonies are the culmination of all the effort students put into realizing this goal. The feeling he gets from witnessing them affirms his purpose for dedicating himself to education, he said.
“This is a milestone occasion for these students and their families and all those who poured into these students over the course of their 13-year academic careers,” Rembert said. “It brings me a lot of happiness.”
As January comes to a close, the end of the 2024-2025 school year is nearly in sight. As of now, it’s unclear whether Marion County Public Schools will see yet another increase in graduation rates or a return to a decline.