Summary:
ZIP code 55342 contains exactly one high school: Buffalo Lake-Hector-Stewart Secondary in Hector, Minnesota. It is a public school serving grades 6 through 12 with 245 students, and it belongs to the Buffalo Lake-Hector-Stewart district. Because it is the only school in the area, there is no second school to compare it with, so the profile below describes this school on its own terms. Roughly 40.82% of students qualify for free or reduced lunch, indicating moderate economic need, and the student-teacher ratio is 14.9.
Academically, the school's results are mixed. Reading is its relative strength: all-grade reading proficiency is 46.0%, close to the state's 48.6%, and grade-level reading is above state in 7th grade (50.0% vs. 43.5%) and essentially at state in 6th grade (53.6% vs. 53.4%). Math and science lag well behind. All-grade math is 26.7% versus the state's 44.9%, and all-grade science is 11.9% versus 25.5%. Sixth-grade math is a bright spot at 46.4% against the state's 39.5%, but high-school-level results are low: 11th-grade math is 9.5% vs. 35.3%, 8th-grade math is 19.4% vs. 42.3%, 8th-grade science is 3.2% vs. 16.7%, and Science End of Course is 19.4% vs. 35.0%. All three subjects declined from 2024–2025 to 2025–2026, with math falling the most.
Outcomes raise concerns. The 2024–2025 graduation rate is 83.8%, slightly below the state's 84.9%, but the dropout rate is 9.6% — more than double the state's 4.2%. Rankings have been volatile: the school was at 2 stars in 2024–2025 but 1 star in both 2023–2024 and 2025–2026, and its current rank is 345 of 473 (27th percentile). The district is rated higher at 3 stars and 53rd percentile (217 of 458), which may reflect other schools or different measures. With only about 35 students per grade, year-to-year percentages can swing widely.
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