Summary:
The city of Mulberry, Arkansas, is served by two public schools within the Mulberry Pleasant View Bi County School District, which together educate 315 students from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade in a community where every single student faces significant economic challenges.
When comparing the two schools, Marvin Primary School (serving grades PK-4) stands out as the relative academic bright spot, consistently outperforming the high school across all subjects. For example, its math proficiency rate of 28.6% and science rate of 35.7% are notably higher than those at Mulberry High School (serving grades 9-12), where math proficiency is critically low—just 7.9% in Algebra and 2.6% in Geometry. The high school has also seen a steep decline in its state ranking, dropping from the 54th percentile in 2023-2024 to the 11th percentile in 2025-2026, while the elementary school’s ranking has improved over the same period. Despite these challenges, the high school maintains a graduation rate of 86.1% and a very low dropout rate of 0.7%.
A key takeaway is that the district spends significantly more per student than the national average—$17,088 at the high school and $16,218 at the elementary school—and enjoys very small class sizes, especially at the high school with a student-teacher ratio of just 5.7:1. However, these advantages have not translated into strong academic outcomes, which are among the lowest in the state. This suggests that the profound effects of 100% student poverty, such as food insecurity and limited academic support at home, are the primary challenges. The crisis in high school mathematics, in particular, demands immediate, targeted intervention to help students build the foundational skills needed for future success.
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