Summary:
ZIP code 85713 has two middle schools, both serving grades 6–8 in Tucson Unified District: Wakefield Middle School enrolls 295 students and Utterback Middle School enrolls 270. In the 2025–26 all-grades results, Wakefield is above the state in English Language Arts (ELA), while Utterback is below the state in both reported subjects; the clearest difference for families is Wakefield’s 24-point ELA and 20-point math leads over Utterback.
Wakefield stands out as the stronger performer: 48% were proficient in ELA, 7 points above the state’s 41%, and 31% in math, 2 points below the state’s 33%. Utterback is the lower performer, with 24% proficient in ELA (17 points below the state) and 11% in math (22 points below). Wakefield’s ELA advantage appears in each grade and is widest in grade 7, at 32 points. SchoolDigger rates Wakefield 3 stars and places it at the 58th statewide percentile; Utterback has 1 star and ranks at the 18th percentile. Wakefield also recorded 46% proficiency in grade 8 science in 2024–25, above the state’s 30% and district’s 17%.
SchoolDigger’s rankings show some improvement in the pair’s average relative standing, though not a steady rise at both schools: Wakefield moved from the 52nd percentile in 2023–24 to 65th, then 58th, while Utterback was at the 18th percentile in both its earliest listed year, 2022–23, and 2025–26. In the two shared years, their average rose from the 33rd percentile in 2023–24 to the 38th in 2025–26. Wakefield’s student-teacher ratio is higher—13.9 compared with Utterback’s 12.3—even as its scores are stronger; these figures do not show that the ratio explains the results. Comparisons are limited because the schools have only one shared year of all-grades test results, Utterback’s grade 6 and 7 math scores are suppressed, and no Utterback grade 8 science score is available.
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