Hennepin Schools

Hennepin Schools in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is a district with two schools serving 447 students in a K–8 configuration: Hennepin Schools Lower Campus for grades K–4 with 240 students, and Hennepin Schools Upper Campus for grades 5–8 with 207 students. There are no high schools or alternative schools in this group. The district, Hennepin Schools, is ranked 381 of 458 Minnesota districts — the 17th percentile — with 1 star, placing it in the bottom fifth of the state.

Lower Campus is the stronger of the two schools and the relative standout. In 2025–2026, it reached 39.5% proficiency in all-grades math, versus 22.7% at Upper Campus and 28% districtwide, and 35.8% in reading, versus 25.3% and 28.6%. Its reading score rose from 21.74% to 35.8%, a gain of 14.06 points — the largest improvement in the data. It also has the lower student-teacher ratio, 10.2 versus 15.8, meaning Upper Campus has roughly 55% more students per teacher. Even so, Lower Campus remains below state proficiency: math is 5.4 points below the state (39.5 vs 44.9) and reading 12.8 points below (35.8 vs 48.6).

Upper Campus faces steeper challenges. Its all-grades proficiency is 22.7% in math, 25.3% in reading, and 13.4% in science — all below state rates. Sixth- and seventh-grade reading are the weakest figures in the data at 18.9% and 9.8%, roughly 34–35 points below state reading proficiency, and those grades' math is 13.2% and 17.1%. Science improved from 7.77% to 13.4% but remains about half the state rate. Upper Campus also fell from 323/545, 41st percentile, 2 stars in 2023–2024 to 448/546, 18th percentile, 1 star in 2025–2026, while Lower Campus rose from the 15th to the 25th percentile, still 1 star. Both schools serve very high-need populations, with free/reduced lunch over 95% at each campus.