Best Public Schools in Clinton, MD

The city of Clinton, Maryland, is served entirely by Prince George's County Public Schools and includes six schools: four elementary schools, one middle school, and one high school, all facing significant academic challenges, particularly in mathematics.

Among the elementary schools, Francis T. Evans Elementary stands out as the academic leader, achieving the highest math proficiency (26.1%) and the lowest chronic absenteeism rate (26.9%) in the city, while also having the lowest percentage of students on free/reduced lunch (60.31%). In contrast, James Ryder Randall Elementary shows a positive trend with three consecutive years of improved state rankings and a standout 5th grade English Language Arts (ELA) proficiency rate of 54.9%, the highest single-grade score in the entire data set, despite having a high poverty rate. Stephen Decatur Middle is the only school in the city to consistently outperform the district in ELA, with its 7th-grade ELA score of 53.2% nearly matching the state average. However, Surrattsville High faces the most severe challenges, with a critically low math proficiency rate of 1.2% and the highest chronic absenteeism rate at 46.5%.

Key metrics reveal a city-wide math crisis, with an average proficiency of just 12.4% compared to the state average of 27.1%, and chronic absenteeism averaging 34.2%, higher than the district average. The data also shows a paradox where the school with the highest spending per student, Surrattsville High ($21,995), has the worst academic outcomes, while Francis T. Evans Elementary achieves the best math scores with the lowest spending among elementary schools ($18,232). This suggests that factors like socioeconomic stability and school culture are more influential than financial input alone in driving student success.