New York City’s Class of 2025 is graduating at a noticeably slower clip. The four-year high school graduation rate slipped to 81.2% for this year’s seniors, a drop of just over two percentage points and the sharpest year-over-year decline the city has logged in more than two decades. The slide hit students with disabilities and English learners hardest and followed the rollback of pandemic-era exam flexibilities. City officials insist they are ramping up supports, while advocates say the numbers lay bare long-standing gaps in preparation and resources.
Citywide, the rate fell from 83.3% for the Class of 2024 to 81.2% for 2025. Statewide, the four-year graduation rate dipped to about 85.5%. Students with disabilities saw their four-year graduation rate tumble roughly 5.5 percentage points to about 59%, and English language learners graduated on time at just over half the rate, near 52%, after a roughly three-point drop. The city’s overall dropout rate nudged up to about 5.2%, according to Chalkbeat.
Regents waivers and policy shifts
Observers are pointing to the rollback of pandemic-era Regents waivers as a prime culprit. Nearly 14% of city graduates in 2025 used a Regents exam waiver, compared with roughly 53% in the Class of 2024. In a statement, Education Department spokesperson Isla Gething said the city remains “committed to high-quality instruction and strengthening targeted supports,” as officials try to help students adjust to the new reality around exam requirements. Those figures and Gething’s statement were reported by Chalkbeat.
Numbers behind the drop
The headcount tells its own story. The city recorded about 58,660 graduates in 2025, compared with roughly 57,353 a year earlier, while the number of students recorded as dropouts rose to about 3,788. At the same time, overall district enrollment kept sliding. Preliminary tallies show the system lost roughly 22,000 students in the latest year, according to reporting by the New York Post.
What this means for students and schools
Educators caution that one off year does not make a trend, but the numbers highlight which students had the most fragile pathways through high school during and after the pandemic. Advocates and school leaders are calling for more targeted tutoring, expanded credit-recovery options, and stronger attendance interventions to help seniors finish on time or shortly after. The policy debate is likely to heat up as state officials move away from relying solely on Regents exams and toward broader performance measures that attempt to capture skills beyond test scores.
For now, the latest results are a reminder that citywide averages conceal big differences between schools and student groups. Parents, principals, and advocates will be watching closely to see whether new supports can keep the Class of 2026 and those that follow on track for graduation.
