Summary:
In zip code 81621, there is one public middle school, Basalt Middle School, serving grades 5 through 8 in the Basalt, Colorado area. Basalt Middle School is part of the Roaring Fork School District No. Re-1 and is the clear focus of this area’s middle school landscape. The school has shown meaningful improvement in its statewide rank over the past three years, moving from the 29th percentile to the 45th percentile, which is a strong positive trend even though its proficiency rates remain below state averages.
Basalt Middle School enrolls 367 students and has a favorable student-teacher ratio of 12.7. The dropout rate is 1.3%, lower than both the district (2.2%) and the state (1.6%). However, chronic absenteeism is a concern at 31.7%, exceeding the district’s 25.8% and the state’s 28.4%. In academic achievement, the school matches the district average in English Language Arts (ELA) at 37.1% proficient, but trails the state by 7.6 points. In math, 28.5% are proficient, which is 3 points below the district and 8.8 points below the state. Encouragingly, math proficiency rose by 4.6 percentage points from the prior year, while ELA dropped by 2.6 points.
Standout patterns include 7th grade ELA at 48.1%, which is above the state average and the strongest subject-grade result at the school. In contrast, 6th grade math proficiency is just 19.2%, a dramatic drop from the same cohort’s 5th grade performance and the most urgent area for intervention. A majority of students (55.6%) receive free or reduced lunch, and with a low dropout rate and improving rank, the school has structural strengths to build upon. Parents should see a school making steady progress, with notable momentum in math and strong literacy in 7th grade, but should be aware of attendance challenges and the need for targeted support in 6th grade math.
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