Summary:
Porter, Indiana has two listed schools, both elementary: Discovery Charter School (K–8, 536 students) and Newton Yost Elementary School (K–4, 362 students), together serving 898 students. There are no middle schools, high schools, or alternative schools in this area summary, and the two schools belong to different districts — Discovery Charter School and Duneland School Corporation — so families are choosing between two quite different options.
Newton Yost Elementary School is the stronger performer overall, ranking 131st of 1,015 Indiana schools (87th percentile, 4 stars) and 40th of 374 districts (89th percentile, 4 stars). Its 2025–26 all-grade proficiency is 62.33% in ELA, 67.12% in Math, and 61.84% in Science, ahead of Discovery in every subject — with the widest gap in Math. Chronic absenteeism is 10.6%, better than its district (15.6%) and the state (16.7%), and its student-teacher ratio of 13.8 is lower than Discovery's 15.7. It spends $13,627 per student compared with Discovery's $8,602. Newton earned 5 stars in 2023–24 and has since held 4 stars, still roughly the top 13% of state schools.
Discovery Charter School is a stable 4-star school (73rd percentile) with real bright spots: 5th grade Social Studies at 80.7% versus the state's 47.2%, 5th grade ELA at 71.93% versus 42.2%, and 3rd grade Math at 71.93% versus 51.9%. Its middle-grade Math and Science results are weaker, however — 6th grade Math at 28.26% and 8th grade Math at 28.57% — and all-grade Science dropped from 58.2% to 46.36% year over year. Its absenteeism rate of 17.4% is slightly above the state average. Worth noting: both schools serve nearly identical free/reduced-lunch populations (39.74% and 40.33%), so differences in student need alone do not explain the performance gap.
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