ON Aug. 1, five students in satiny green-and-red robes and mortarboards waited in an elementary school classroom to hear their names called as graduates of Normandy High School. This ceremony, held months after the official graduation, was mostly for students who had been short of credits in May.

One of those new graduates was Michael Brown. He was 18, his mother’s oldest son. He had been planning to start college in September.

Eight days later, he was dead, killed in the streets of nearby Ferguson, Mo., by a white police officer in a shooting that ignited angry protests and a painful national debate about race, policing and often elusive justice. Many news reports after Mr. Brown’s death noted his graduation and his college plans. The implication was that these scholarly achievements magnified the sorrow.

But if Michael Brown’s educational experience was a success story, it was a damning one.

The Normandy school district is among the poorest and most segregated in Missouri. It ranks last in overall academic performance. Its rating on an annual state assessment was so dismal that by the time Mr. Brown graduated the district had lost its state accreditation.