Summary:
Culver, Minnesota has two public schools — South Ridge Elementary serving grades PK–6 with 303 students, and South Ridge Secondary serving grades 7–12 with 258 students — both operating on the same campus in the St. Louis County School District, which ranks 323 of 458 districts in Minnesota at the 29th percentile with 1 star. Together they enroll 561 students, and both are below the state median in most tested subjects.
South Ridge Elementary is the stronger of the two academically. Its 2025–2026 rank percentile is 36, above the district's 29 and South Ridge Secondary's 25. It beats the district in all-grade Math and Reading, and its 3rd grade Math proficiency of 71.8% stands out against 62.1% in the district and 57.9% statewide. That early strength does not carry upward: 4th through 6th grade Math ranges from 28.6% to 37.1%, all below the state. Elementary's all-grade proficiency is 43.2% in Math, 43.9% in Reading, and just 8.1% in Science.
South Ridge Secondary is the opposite story: strong completion, weak test scores. Its graduation rate is 92.5% and dropout rate 2.5%, both better than the state's 84.9% and 4.2%, yet all-grade proficiency is only 16.8% in Math, 31.3% in Reading, and 13.4% in Science. Science is the clearest shared weakness — Elementary 8.1%, Secondary 13.4%, and the district 17.1%, all far below the state's 25.5%, with 8th grade Science at 5.3%. Both schools serve similar populations (free/reduced lunch of 39.27% and 42.64%), but Secondary has a higher student-teacher ratio of 15.5 versus 12.8 at Elementary, alongside lower test proficiency.
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