Summary:
Alpena, Arkansas is served by a single high school, Alpena High School, which educates 183 students in grades 7 through 12 as part of the Alpena School District, a district ranked 67th out of 251 in the state with a 4-star rating.
Alpena High School offers an exceptionally personalized learning environment with a student-teacher ratio of just 3:1, and it outperforms state averages in core subjects like English Language Arts (41.8% proficient vs. 39.4% state), Reading (44.5% vs. 40.4%), Mathematics (50.8% vs. 44.1%), and general Science (47.6% vs. 44.0%). The school also boasts a strong graduation rate of 94.5% and a very low dropout rate of 1.4%. However, the school struggles significantly in Biology, where only 29.4% of students are proficient compared to the state average of 42.7%, and in Algebra, where proficiency is 34.4% versus the state's 36.9%. A notable concern is that while test scores are improving year-over-year in most subjects, the school's state ranking has been steadily declining, dropping from the 83rd percentile in 2023-2024 to the 58th percentile in 2025-2026, indicating that other schools are improving at a faster pace.
For parents, the key takeaway is that Alpena High School provides a strong foundation in general academics with a very supportive, small-school atmosphere, but it faces challenges in advanced science and math courses. The dramatic one-year drop in Biology scores (from 51.5% to 29.4%) suggests volatility that may stem from its small size, where a single teacher change or a weak cohort can heavily impact results. The declining state rank, despite improving scores, is a warning sign that the school may need to accelerate its improvement efforts to keep pace with other Arkansas schools.
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