The Globe’s Valedictorians Project featured more than its share of surprising statistics, but one figure resonated deeply with readers: Forty percent of Boston valedictorians from 2005 to 2007 make $50,000 or less each year. In other words, many of Boston’s brightest students are struggling to make a middle-class income more than a decade after graduation.
Boston’s valedictorians were supposed to be among the students most likely to succeed. The ones who became doctors, lawyers, scientists, or business leaders — certainly the ones who earn more than Massachusetts’ average full-time salary of $62,110.
But the numbers don’t lie. They’re part of a larger pattern of Boston public school valedictorians who are falling behind economically the valedictorians from communities surrounding Boston. The one exception: graduates of the city’s three prestigious exam schools. For almost everyone else, there’s a sense that life got a lot tougher after high school.