Best Public Schools in Laurel, DE

The city of Laurel, Delaware, is served by the Laurel School District, which includes four schools spanning early learning through 12th grade, and the district currently holds a 2-star rating, ranking 22nd out of 34 districts in the state.

For parents, the standout story is Laurel Middle School, which has made a remarkable turnaround, jumping from the 15th to the 42nd percentile in just two years. It boasts the district's lowest chronic absenteeism rate at just 1.7%—far better than the district average of 18.7%—and its 7th-grade English Language Arts proficiency (43.5%) actually matches the state average. In contrast, Laurel Senior High School faces serious challenges, particularly in math, where only 4.76% of students meet SAT college-readiness benchmarks, compared to the state's 18.16%. The high school also struggles with a 27.2% chronic absenteeism rate and a graduation rate of 79.4%, which is nearly 10 points below the state average. Laurel Elementary School sits in the middle, with math proficiency running 15-21 points below state averages across all grades, while North Laurel Early Learning Academy has the highest per-student spending ($19,909) but also the highest chronic absenteeism in the district at 31.9%.

The data reveals a clear pattern: attendance and achievement go hand-in-hand. The middle school's near-perfect attendance correlates with its strong performance, while the high school and early learning academy's high absenteeism rates align with their academic struggles. There is also a troubling math decline between middle and high school—8th-grade math proficiency is 27.87%, but by 11th grade, SAT math proficiency collapses to 4.76%. The district's most urgent priorities should be replicating the middle school's success, tackling chronic absenteeism at the high school and early learning academy, and addressing the high school math crisis through targeted interventions.