Summary:
ZIP code 85048 has two high schools: Desert Vista High School, serving grades 9–12, and Horizon Honors Secondary School, serving grades 7–12. Desert Vista enrolls 2,761 students and Horizon 678. Both schools’ reported ELA, math and science proficiency results are above their corresponding Arizona figures. The most important takeaway is that both schools perform well above state results, though which one leads depends on the grade and subject.
Desert Vista leads the all-grades results: in 2025–26, its ELA proficiency was 70% versus 60% at Horizon, and its math proficiency was 63% versus 49%. Those are school-to-school gaps of 10 and 14 percentage points; both schools were also well above state figures. In the shared 11th grade, however, Horizon leads in ELA, 75% to 70%, and math, 73% to 63%. Desert Vista leads 11th-grade science, 46% to 39%, in 2024–25. Neither school is the bottom performer in the area’s results: every reported result exceeds its state comparison. Horizon’s additional 7th- and 8th-grade results also exceed state figures. Because Horizon serves grades 7–8 as well, all-grades results are not fully comparable between schools.
SchoolDigger rankings improved overall for both schools from 2023–24 to 2025–26: Desert Vista moved from 39th of 270 Arizona schools to 23rd of 256, while Horizon moved from 26th of 270 to 13th of 256, after ranking 37th in 2024–25. Desert Vista’s graduation rate was 94% in 2024–25, 14 percentage points above the state’s 80%; Horizon’s available rate is from 2020–21, so it is not a same-year comparison. The size and staffing figures do not point to one simple advantage: Desert Vista is about four times larger and has a higher student–teacher ratio (22.4 versus 15.7), yet it leads all-grades results while Horizon leads in 11th-grade ELA and math. ELA and math scores are available for only one year, so they do not show whether proficiency is rising or falling.
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