The new method of calculating Georgia's graduation rate has dropped the state from a solid 85 percent down to 67.4 percent and Newton County down to a dismal 64.14 percent - a 20 percent drop from how the rate was previously calculated. Since 2003 the state has used the leaver method of calculating graduations rates. Under the new four-year cohort graduation rate system, the graduation numbers should more accurately reveal how students are doing compared to other schools in the county, the state and in several other states as well.