Missouri ranks among the top-performing states in the nation for boosting high school graduation rates, according to White House figures released this week. On the face of it, that's great news because the alternative — returning to the dropout-factory formula — is unacceptable.

Missouri has marked steady and dramatic improvement in high school graduation rates during the past four years, moving from 81 percent of students receiving diplomas in the 2010-2011 school year to 87.8 percent in the 2014-2015 school year.

So why not celebrate this achievement with unbridled enthusiasm?

Our reluctance is based on the fact that test scores for college readiness are either flat or falling nationwide. On the ACT College Readiness Benchmarks, Missouri students currently lag behind the national performance average, and the national average is far from inspiring.

America's high schools are churning out record numbers of graduates who still appear unprepared in basic reading, writing and math skills to address the real-world challenges that come with a high school degree.

"For many students, a high school diploma is not a passport to opportunity, it's a ticket to nowhere," Michael Cohen, president of Achieve, a national nonprofit, told National Public Radio. Cohen wants higher standards and graduation requirements.

This has broad implications across the job and educational spectrum. For junior colleges and four-year universities, higher numbers of underprepared freshmen mean greater demand for remedial instruction. No wonder the nationwide college dropout rate hovers near 50 percent.

High schools are simply passing the basic educational burden up the chain to the college level. Increasingly, university professors say they encounter students who cannot read basic texts or compose simple, grammatically correct sentences. It means someone at the high school level has given those students a passing grade when it wasn't deserved.

Employers must now question the true worth of a high school diploma if they cannot rely on it as an accurate barometer of basic skills. The nation is already flush with college graduates who are struggling to find employment, giving employers even less of an incentive to treat a high school diploma as a badge of distinction.

For states like Missouri, student underpreparedness matters in terms of being able to attract companies that need a ready workforce to handle complex production demands. If employers have to worry about remedial instruction just to ensure their production stays on track, they will gladly choose to be based in other states or countries where the work force is more reliable.

The terms "college- and career-ready," which roll off the tongues of politicians and school superintendents with stunning regularity, are meaningless if they don't actually apply to the students who proudly don cap and gown to receive their diplomas each year.

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