Summary:
ZIP code 61231 has three schools in Mercer County School District 404, serving kindergarten through grade 12: Apollo Elementary School (362 students), Mercer County Junior High School (270), and Mercer County High School (411). Together they enroll 1,043 students. The most consistent academic concern is math: results were below state rates at every school level, with the junior high’s all-grades proficiency at 18% versus 40% statewide, a 22-point gap.
Apollo stands out in grade 4 ELA and grade 5 science: its results were 63% versus 56% statewide in ELA, and 56% versus 48% in science. The junior high’s strongest result was grade 8 science, at 62% compared with 52% statewide; its weakest was grade 7 math, at 15%, 25 points below the state. At Mercer County High School, grade 10 ELA was the closest result to the state rate, at 52% versus 54%, but remained 2 points below. High-school results were below state rates in all reported subject-grade measures.
Recent results are mixed: average ELA gaps improved from 8 points below the state in 2024–25 to 5 points below in 2025–26, while math gaps widened from 10 to 13 points below and science gaps from 3 to 5 points below. SchoolDigger’s 2025–26 rankings put Apollo at the 44th percentile (2 stars), the high school at the 30th (2 stars), and the junior high at the 23rd (1 star). Chronic absenteeism was notably higher at the high school: 38%, compared with 21% at Apollo, 24% at the junior high, and 24% statewide. As context, 2024–25 free/reduced lunch eligible shares were 52% at Apollo, 50% at the junior high, and 42% at the high school; student–teacher ratios ranged from 11.3 to 13.0.
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