Summary:
ZIP code 55309 in Minnesota contains two listed high schools, both part of the Big Lake Public School District: Big Lake Senior High, serving grades 9–12 with 902 students, and Big Lake Online 6-12, serving grades 6–12 with 118 students. Because the online school includes middle-school grades, the two are not a perfectly like-for-like comparison. The district is ranked 188th of 458 in Minnesota, at the 59th percentile with 3 stars.
Big Lake Senior High is the larger school and the stronger performer on most measures. Its graduation rate of 96.2% is above the district's 95.3% and well above the state's 84.9%, and its dropout rate of 2.3% is below the state's 4.2%. Science proficiency reached 28.1% in 2025–2026, above the district's 22% and the state's 25.5%, while 10th-grade reading was 44.2%, also above both. Math is the clear weak spot: all-grades math was 29% in 2025–2026, against 45.1% in the district and 44.9% statewide. Its rank history has swung from 4 stars and the 76th percentile in 2023–2024 to 2 stars and the 43rd percentile in 2024–2025, then back to 3 stars and the 51st percentile in 2025–2026.
Big Lake Online 6-12 has a different profile. Its graduation rate of 91.4% is above the state's 84.9% but below the district's 95.3%, and its dropout rate of 2.1% is slightly lower than Big Lake Senior High's 2.3%. Its free/reduced-price lunch share of 43.22% is much higher than the 28.71% at Big Lake Senior High — important context when comparing test results. Proficiency is lower: 8.3% in math and 31.6% in reading in 2025–2026, with science suppressed in both years and many 2025–2026 grade-level scores suppressed, so its full academic picture is unknown rather than zero. Its reported student-teacher ratio of 140.4, versus 19.6 at Big Lake Senior High, likely reflects a different staffing model for an online school. Available rank history slipped from the 33rd percentile and 2 stars in 2022–2023 to the 11th percentile and 1 star in 2023–2024.
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