Schools in Zip Code 66538

Zip code 66538 has two Nemaha Central Elementary and Middle School (pre-K–8, 509 students) and Nemaha Central High School (grades 9–12, 242 students), serving 751 students in the Nemaha Central district. The clearest contrast is science: the elementary/middle school’s all-grades proficiency is 62%, 24 percentage points above the state, while the high school’s is 26%, 12 points below it.

The elementary/middle school stands out in science, including fifth-grade results 14 points above the state and eighth-grade results 25 points above. The high school’s strongest reported areas are ELA and math: its all-grades results are 10 and 12 points above state results, respectively. Both schools are above the state in all-grades ELA and math, and their reported results are close to one another: the school-to-school gaps are about 1 point in ELA and less than 1 point in math. Grade-level results show some exceptions: elementary/middle third-grade math is 2 points below the state, and fifth-grade ELA is 1 point below. The high school’s 11th-grade science result is 4 points below the state. The schools cover different grades, so their all-grades results are not direct, like-for-like comparisons.

Recent trends are mixed: the equal-school ELA average rose from 45% to 56% between 2024–25 and 2025–26, largely reflecting the high school’s 22-point increase; the math average rose from 52% to 53%, while its advantage over the state narrowed from 13 to 12 points. SchoolDigger ranks the high school 84th of 340 schools (75th percentile), up 35 places from the prior year, and the elementary/middle school 193rd of 657 (71st percentile). The elementary/middle school has a 12.9 student-teacher ratio and a 35% free/reduced-lunch rate, compared with 16.1 and 20% at the high school; these are useful context, not explanations for results. Both schools’ absenteeism rates are below the state’s, and the high school graduation rate is 9 points above the state.