RALEIGH - More than two-thirds of North Carolina's public high school students are graduating within four years, but the numbers are sharply lower for black and Hispanic students.

Figures released today by the state Department of Public Instruction show that 68.1 percent of freshmen who entered high school in 2002 graduated four years later. This is the first comprehensive look at high school graduation rates conducted by the state.

The results showed noticeable gaps in the graduation rate among racial, ethnic and economic groups. While 73.6 percent of white students graduated, the rate dropped to 60 percent for blacks, 55.3 percent for low-income students and 51.8 percent for Hispanics.

There was also a gap among the sexes, with 72.4 percent of female students graduating, compared with 63.9 percent of males.

Locally, most Triangle school districts performed above the state average.

The Chapel Hill-Carrboro school system had the highest graduation rate in the state at 90.2 percent. Wake County had the third-highest rate at 82.6 percent. Johnston County was at 74.5 percent, and Durham was at 68.8 percent. Chatham County had a graduation rate of 67.1 percent and Orange County had a a graduation rate of 66.5 percent.

The new state graduation figures are in line with what's been reported by other groups.

The Manhattan Institute estimated in a report last year that North Carolina's graduation rate was 69 percent for the class of 2003 -- worse than 33 other states. Other groups have placed the state's graduation rate in the low- to mid-60s percent range for the past several years.

Until this year, the state relied on an annual dropout rate as the single measure of schools' success in keeping students on track to graduation. But the dropout rate reflects only the percentage of students in all four grades of high school who quit in any given year.

Under the federal No Child Left Behind law, states and schools are required to report a graduation rate. But until this year, North Carolina has reported an on-time rate, showing the percentage of graduates who finished in four years. That number, which has ranged above 90 percent, has been criticized by education advocacy groups as deceptive.

State education leaders say schools lacked the accounting ability to accurately track students and began better procedures when the class or 2006 entered as freshmen in 2002. The four-year graduation rate will now be released yearly as part of state and federal accountability reports.

The state will also release five-year graduation statistics after the end of the current school year -- a percentage officials expect to be better than today's four-year rate.

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