Summary:
The Howard Lake-Waverly-Winsted district in Minnesota includes five schools serving about 1,284 students across three levels: two PK–4 elementaries (Humphrey Elementary and Winsted Elementary), one grades 5–8 middle school (Howard Lake-Waverly-Winsted Middle), and two grades 9–12 high schools (Howard Lake-Waverly-Winsted Sec. and the much smaller Hlww Alternative Learning Program). The district is ranked 269th of 458 in Minnesota, in the 41st percentile with a 2-star rating.
Each school has a different standout area. The middle school has the district's best rank (237th of 546, 57th percentile, 3 stars) and the strongest reading score at 52.1%, above the district (45.2%) and state (48.6%), though its science score of 12.6% and math score of 25.9% are weak. Humphrey Elementary posts the top math score at 53.4%, above the state's 44.9%, and has the lowest student-teacher ratio at 12.7, while Winsted Elementary reaches 49.4% in math despite the highest free/reduced lunch rate (39.91%). The comprehensive high school stands out for a 95.0% graduation rate and 0.9% dropout rate, both better than the state, plus a 29.5% science score that beats the state; its math (26.9%) and reading (29.4%) are below district and state averages.
District-wide, scores trail the state in math (33%), reading (45.2%), and science (17.3%), but individual schools beat the state in specific subjects, so the average hides real strengths. Rank trends are mostly flat or declining — the high school fell from 3 stars to 2, and the middle school slipped from the 66th to the 57th percentile — while Humphrey improved from the 33rd to the 40th percentile. The alternative program is very small at 24 students, with reading and science scores suppressed by the state, so those results should be treated as unknown rather than as failures.
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