Summary:
ZIP code 85254 has three middle schools: Cocopah Middle School serves grades 6–8, while Desert Shadows Middle School and Sunrise Middle School serve grades 5–8; enrollment ranges from 390 to 861 students. All three schools score above Arizona’s results in every reported school-level comparison, though their results vary notably from school to school. The clearest overall standout is Cocopah, which leads in all-grades ELA and math and in eighth-grade science.
Cocopah records 69% in both all-grades ELA and math, compared with 61% and 54% at Desert Shadows and 52% and 40% at Sunrise. Its advantage over Sunrise is 17 points in ELA and 29 points in math. Cocopah also leads eighth-grade science, at 54%, versus 45% at Desert Shadows and 43% at Sunrise; all three exceed the state’s 30%. Sunrise has the lowest all-grades results, but remains above state results by 11 points in ELA and 7 points in math. One grade-specific exception to the overall order is grade 7 ELA: Desert Shadows leads at 69%, one point ahead of Cocopah.
SchoolDigger’s statewide rankings show different recent trajectories: Cocopah moved from the 93rd to the 94th percentile between 2023–24 and 2025–26, while Desert Shadows rose from the 79th to the 86th and Sunrise fell from the 77th to the 71st. In 2025–26, SchoolDigger ranked Cocopah 32nd of 536 Arizona schools and gave it five stars. Class-size ratios alone do not mirror the achievement pattern: Sunrise has the lowest reported student–teacher ratio, 15.7, compared with 19.5 at Cocopah and 20.1 at Desert Shadows, yet its all-grades results are lowest. Enrollment and results follow the same order in this small group, but that pattern does not establish a broader relationship. Scores cover one year, and the schools have different grade spans.
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