Best Middle Schools in Zip Code 49544

Middle Schools in zip code 49544 consist of a single school, Kenowa Hills Middle School, which serves grades 6 through 8 with an enrollment of 634 students in the Kenowa Hills Public Schools district.

Kenowa Hills Middle School presents a mixed academic profile, with clear strengths in some areas and notable challenges in others. The school’s state ranking has been remarkably stable over the past three years, hovering between the 52nd and 55th percentile, indicating consistent performance relative to other Michigan middle schools. In the most recent year, the school ranked 428 out of 896 schools. Test scores reveal significant variation by subject and grade level. The school excels in 7th-grade math, with a proficiency rate of 41.9% that is well above the state average of 33.3%, and 8th-grade PSAT ELA proficiency (65.3%) is slightly above the state average. However, 7th-grade ELA proficiency (31.8%) falls well below the state average of 38.4%, and 8th-grade Social Studies (39.5%) and Science (33%) also trail state averages. The 8th-grade PSAT math proficiency (29.6%) also lags behind the state average of 33.2%, suggesting students may enter high school with a relative weakness in math.

The most concerning data point is the chronic absenteeism rate of 34.5%, which is significantly higher than both the district average of 24.1% and the state average of 27.9%. This means over one-third of students are chronically absent, which is likely a key factor in the school’s mixed academic performance. Additionally, 39.59% of students are eligible for free or reduced lunch, and the student-teacher ratio is 17.1 to 1. Test scores also show significant year-over-year volatility, such as 7th-grade math proficiency jumping from 30.2% to 41.9% in one year, making it difficult to assess instructional effectiveness from a single year’s data. Since this is the only middle school in the district, its performance directly determines the district’s middle school ranking.