Student Preparation Seen to Fall Short of College Expectations

Even though more than 80 percent of the 80,000-plus high school students responding to a recent survey expect to go to college after graduation, far fewer are shouldering the kind of academic preparation they need to succeed there, the survey results suggest.

“I think our data give a wake-up call to high schools to say we need to make our courses more challenging,” said Martha M. McCarthy, the director of the High School Survey of Student Engagement, which is conducted every spring by Indiana University Bloomington. This year’s results were released Aug. 17.

The survey...