Thirteen more Hamilton County high school graduates decided to go on to college in 2009 over the previous year, officials announced Wednesday.
The 72 percent college-bound rate is up from 70 percent in 2008, but hasn’t fully recovered after dropping from 73 percent in 2007, records show.
Central High School principal Finley King attributes his school’s college-going success to making students more aware of their options. Seventy-four percent of Central’s 2009 high school graduates attended college this year, up from 65 percent the previous year.
PDF: College going trends
“We have a lot of students who come from homes where their parents didn’t go to college. We have to immerse them in a situation where college is a conversation that everyone is having with them,” he said. “It’s one thing to say you’re a UT fan and you like UT, but what does it take to get there? I don’t want them to think that college is a thing only private-school students do.”