DEER ISLE (AP) — Maine’s high school graduation rate rose in 2012 for the third year in a row, the state’s top education official said Monday.

Education Commissioner Stephen Bowen released statewide results that showed Maine’s four-year graduation rate rose to above 85 percent in 2012, a jump of about 1.5 percentage points over 2011 anda5percentage-point improvement since 2009.

Bowen announced the results during a press conference at Deer Isle-Stonington High School in Deer Isle, where the graduation rate has risen from 58 percent to 94 percent in the past three years.

“This is great news for Maine education and a testament to a lot of hard work by a lot of educators,” Bowen said. “What we need to do now is really dig down into the data — which schools are making gains, and what are they doing? Then, let’s do more of what works.”

Bowen cautioned there’s plenty of room for improvement. Forty-eight of Maine’s 133 high schools did not reach the 83-percent target graduation rate in 2012, and 40 percent of the schools did not improve their graduation rate between 2011 and 2012, he said.

Wells High School had the highest four-year graduation rate, 99 percent, in 2012 among Maine’s public high schools. Wiscasset High School had the lowest rate, at about 62 percent.