At the beginning of the year, when Colorado education officials announced the four-year graduation rate for the state’s high school students, those officials exuded optimism. The rate at which students entering the ninth grade earned a high school diploma had continued in march upward, landing at 78.9 percent.

What was even better, those officials said, was that the five-year rate (which included those students who may have enrolled in an alternative high school program or even an early college credit program) was 83.3 percent. That placed Colorado at or above the national average for the five-year diploma rate.

In a further analysis of the four-year graduate rate, however, the advocacy group GradNation sees areas for concern. With Colorado’s 77.3 percent on-time graduation rate in 2015, the state ends up seventh from the bottom as measured by that metric.

Read more at The Loveland Reporter-Herald’s website.