Summary:
In zip code 72946, there is one middle school, Mountainburg Middle School Brain Academy, serving grades 6 through 8 in the rural community of Mountainburg, Arkansas, with a total enrollment of 132 students.
Mountainburg Middle School Brain Academy is part of the Mountainburg School District, which holds a 2-star rating and ranks 152nd out of 251 districts in Arkansas. The school itself has a 1-star rating and ranks 234th out of 327 middle schools statewide. A standout feature is the school's 7th-grade mathematics proficiency rate of 48.4%, which exceeds the state average of 44.2%. However, 6th-grade performance is a significant challenge, with English Language Arts proficiency at just 17.9% compared to the state average of 40.8%. Overall proficiency across all grades trails state averages in every subject: English Language Arts (27.9% vs. 39.4%), Reading (30.4% vs. 40.4%), Mathematics (33.3% vs. 44.1%), and Science (30.7% vs. 44.0%).
Key metrics include a low student-teacher ratio of 11.7:1 and per-student spending of $11,682, which is relatively high for a small rural school. The school reports that 100% of its students qualified for free or reduced lunch in the 2024-2025 school year. A notable pattern is the "7th Grade Bounce," where 7th graders dramatically outperform 6th graders—by 24.5 percentage points in ELA and 20.2 points in Math—suggesting that targeted support for incoming 6th graders could be highly beneficial. The school's state ranking has slipped from the 37th percentile in previous years to the 28th percentile in 2025-2026, indicating a need for focused interventions to improve overall academic outcomes.
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