Summary:
The Ida Public School District is home to a single high school, Ida High School, which serves grades 9 through 12 in the small, rural community of Ida, Michigan, with an enrollment of 451 students.
Ida High School is a standout performer in the state, consistently earning a top-quartile ranking and a 4-star rating. Its graduation rate is exceptional at 97.8%, far surpassing the Michigan average of 84.0%, and its dropout rate is a mere 1.0% compared to the state's 7.1%. The school also excels in English Language Arts, with 9th and 10th graders scoring well above state averages on the PSAT (67.9% and 67.2% proficient, respectively). However, the most recent data reveals a concerning trend: 11th-grade proficiency scores dropped significantly across all subjects from the previous year. Science fell from 56.8% to 46.7%, social studies from 55.7% to 43.4%, and SAT math plummeted from 33.3% to 22.0%, which is now below the state average of 26.5%. This decline, coupled with a persistent gap where math proficiency (around 40% in lower grades) lags roughly 27 points behind ELA, suggests a systemic challenge in mathematics that warrants attention.
While the school benefits from a relatively affluent student body (only 15% qualify for free/reduced lunch) and efficient resource allocation ($12,167 per student with a 16.2:1 ratio), its chronic absenteeism rate of 15.3% is notably higher than the district-wide rate of 11.9%. This indicates that while attendance is better than the state average (27.9%), there is a subset of high school students who could benefit from targeted intervention. The school's strong early high school performance suggests solid foundational instruction, but the recent 11th-grade score drops and the widening math gap are key areas for parents to monitor as the school works to maintain its high ranking.
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