Summary:
Finlayson, Minnesota is home to two high schools, both serving grades 7–12 within the East Central School District and both listed at 61085 State Highway 23 — the larger East Central Senior Secondary with 309 students and the much smaller Crossroads Area Learning Center with 32 students.
East Central Senior Secondary is the comprehensive school and the only one of the two with reported school-level test scores. Its rank rose to 224 of 473 with 3 stars in 2025–2026 after sitting near the bottom quartile the two prior years. Science is its standout: 26.7% proficient at All Grades, above the district's 20.3% and the state's 25.5%, and End of Course Science at 37.7% versus the state's 35.0%. Math at 20.6% and Reading at 29.7% remain well below state averages of 44.9% and 48.6%, with the weakest results in 7th grade Reading (17.6% vs 43.5%) and in 7th and 8th grade Math.
Crossroads Area Learning Center is very small, has far higher economic need at 71.88% free/reduced lunch versus 37.54%, and has no school-level test scores because the state suppressed them. Those figures should be treated as unknown, not as zeros or as a sign of weakness. Its older rankings, from 2018–2019 through 2022–2023, placed it in the bottom 1–10% with 0 stars, but those are dated. Graduation rates are close (77.2% vs 76.1%), while its dropout rate of 13.6% is higher. The East Central School District is ranked 313 of 458, in the 32nd percentile with 2 stars, and trails state averages in core subjects, graduation (84.9% statewide), and dropout (4.2% statewide).
Thank you for your feedback!