HUNTINGTON -- Updated report cards on performance shows West Virginia high schools are doing better than neighboring states in regard to dropouts and "promoting power," but falling short in performance on a national test.

The reports, released March 13 by the Alliance for Excellent Education, showed in comparison to Ohio and Kentucky, West Virginia only has four high schools graduating 60 percent or less of their freshmen classes, which is considered the minimum for avoiding meeting the alliance's definition of a "dropout factory."

There are 28 dropout factories in Kentucky and 63 in Ohio, according to the study. In percentage terms, 3.5 percent of West Virginia's 114 high schools are dropout factories, while 8.1 percent of Ohio's 770 high schools and 12.6 percent of Kentucky's 221 high schools fall into that category.

In 2007, that equated to 6,700 dropouts in West Virginia, 16,400 in Kentucky and 40,700 in Ohio.

The methodology used by the Alliance for Excellent Education, a national policy and advocacy organization led by former West Virginia Gov. Bob Wise, is what Johns Hopkins University researchers call promoting power. In it simplest terms, it compares the number of seniors enrolled in a high school to the number of ninth graders enrolled in the high school three years earlier.

Promoting power, researchers say, is a good indicator of high schools' graduation rates. It is very likely that high schools which have 60 percent or fewer seniors than freshmen four years earlier will have unacceptably low graduation rates by state and national standards.

There are no Tri-State schools among those, and only one -- Huntington High at 69.83 percent -- is below 70 percent. Both Boyd County and Blazer high schools in Boyd County, Ky., had scores in the upper 70s, while Cabell Midland High School and Fairland, South Point, Chesapeake and Ironton high schools in Lawrence County, Ohio, are at 85 percent or above.

But West Virginia education has its weaknesses, the report said, none greater than the gap between eighth grade WESTEST reading and math scores and NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) scores.

While 81 percent of West Virginia's eighth-graders scored at proficiency or higher on the WESTEST, only 22 percent achieved the same result in reading on the NAEP. For math it was 73 and 18 percent, respectively. Jeff Smith, Cabell County Schools director of assessment and curriculum, said the problem is the WESTEST was written at a very basic level, while the NAEP test requires students to think more critically before answering.

Next year, WESTEST 2 will be launched, rewritten closer to the rigor of the NAEP. But Smith said to expect it to get worse before it gets better.

"I think you'll see somewhat of a struggle on the WESTEST 2 because it is based around a higher order of thinking skills," Smith said.

"Our WESTEST has served its purpose," he continued. "It told us whether our students are mastering the content standards."

With the transition to 21st century skills meaning more rigor and relevance, Smith, like other school officials, believes students will become more engaged and enjoy the learning process more than they do now.

"If we do what we should be doing, we will have students thinking at higher levels and be much more engaged," Smith said.

West Virginia also lags behind in the number of secondary classes in high- and low-poverty areas taught by highly qualified teachers, the alliance reported.

In 2007, 84.8 percent of secondary classes in high-poverty schools were taught by a highly qualified teacher, with the percent reaching 90.5 for low-poverty schools. In Ohio, those percentages were 87.2 and 98.8, and in Kentucky, it was 96.7 and 97.6 percent for high- and low-poverty schools.