New York State has released a mountain of data that shows, among other things, that the racial gap for graduation rates in Buffalo has gotten slightly worse over the past few years

The four-year graduation rate for black students in the Class of 2011 was 52%; for whites, 64%; Hispanics, 44%; and Asians, 51%. The gap between black and white students in the district increased from 10 to 12 points in the past four years; the gap between Hispanic and white students remained at 20 points. Whatever racial group constitutes the majority in a school usually ends up with the highest graduation rate in that building. For instance, white students constituted the majority of the senior class at City Honors, South Park and da Vinci. They also had the highest graduation rate at each of those schools. Black students had a higher graduation rate than white or Hispanic students at nine out of 16 high schools in the city: Bennett, Burgard, East, Emerson, Lafayette, McKinley, Occupational Training Center, Oracle Charter and Tapestry Charter. Of those, Lafayette was the only school where blacks did not constitute the majority of the graduating class. (There were 71 Hispanic students in Lafayette's Class of 2011, and 70 black students.) And at four high schools, Hispanic students had a higher graduation rate than white or black students at Hutch Tech, International Prep, Performing Arts and Riverside. At each of those schools, there were more black students in the graduating class than any other racial group. What this seems to indicate is that if you want your child to graduate, send them to a school where their racial group constitutes the majority.