Best Public Schools in Zip Code 36608

Zip code 36608 in Mobile, Alabama, is served by 10 public schools spanning Pre-K through 12th grade, with a total enrollment of roughly 6,585 students across the Mobile County and MAEF Public Charter Schools districts.

For parents, the standout choice in this area is ClarkShaw Magnet School, which ranks in the 97th percentile statewide and outperforms every other school in the zip code by a wide margin—its 6th-grade English proficiency is 90.6% compared to the state average of 56.77%, and its chronic absenteeism rate of 2.7% is the lowest in the area. Taylor White Elementary School and Elsie Collier Elementary School are solid mid-tier options, ranking in the 67th and 54th percentiles respectively. Baker High School is also worth noting for its strong recovery—it jumped from the 60th to the 78th percentile in one year, with double-digit gains in math, science, and English proficiency, and it boasts a 93.3% graduation rate. On the other end, ER Dickson Elementary School and John Will Elementary School rank in the bottom 20th percentile, while the two charter schools—Acceleration Preparatory Academy and Acceleration Day and Evening Academy—rank in the bottom 10% statewide, with 8th-grade math proficiency at just 0.76% at the middle school.

Key takeaways for families: poverty levels and chronic absenteeism are strong predictors of performance here. Schools with lower free/reduced lunch rates, like ClarkShaw and Baker, consistently outperform those with higher poverty rates, such as John Will (88.71% free/reduced lunch) and the Acceleration schools. Attendance matters too—ClarkShaw's 2.7% absenteeism correlates with its top ranking, while Augusta Evans School, with 23.5% absenteeism, shows the lowest performance despite spending $35,051 per student. Interestingly, Augusta Evans posts 36% proficiency in 11th-grade science, matching the state average, suggesting a possible specialized focus. The widest gap is at the elementary level, where Taylor White and Elsie Collier outperform ER Dickson and John Will by 40-50 percentile points, making early intervention the highest-leverage opportunity for improvement in this zip code.