High Schools in Muskegon Public Schools of the City of

The two high schools serving Muskegon Public Schools of the City of — Muskegon High School and Muskegon Community Education Center — serve grades 9-12 in a district ranked in the bottom 4% of Michigan schools, with roughly 1,100 combined students and high levels of economic need.

Muskegon High School is the district’s traditional comprehensive high school with 1,003 students. It outperforms the alternative campus on nearly every academic measure: its graduation rate of 84.6% exceeds the state average, while its chronic absenteeism rate of 50.6% — though nearly double the state norm — is far better than the alternative school’s staggering 90.7%. Test proficiency is critically low at both schools, but Muskegon High still leads, with 17% proficiency in 11th-grade science and 24% in social studies, compared to just 13.6% in social studies at the Community Education Center. The alternative school does have one advantage: a lower dropout rate (4.5% vs. 8.1%), suggesting it may be successfully keeping at-risk students formally enrolled.

The Muskegon Community Education Center serves just 107 students and spends $23,000 per pupil — $7,567 more than Muskegon High — yet produces weaker outcomes where data exists. This higher spending likely reflects the intensive support needed for a high-needs population, not academic success. The most striking finding is the absenteeism crisis: with 90.7% of students chronically absent, the alternative school’s flexible, self-paced model may explain why students don’t formally drop out but also don’t consistently attend. District-wide, math proficiency is alarmingly low — just 6.5-9% of Muskegon High 9th and 10th graders are proficient — representing a foundational challenge. Still, Muskegon High’s above-average graduation rate offers a glimmer of hope, showing that despite low test scores and high absenteeism, most students do earn their diplomas.