Summary:
ZIP code 56387 covers Waite Park, Minnesota, where three schools — one elementary and two high schools serving grades 6–12 — enroll a combined 862 students, all within the St. Cloud Public School District, which itself ranks 363 of 458 in Minnesota (21st percentile, 1 star). Discovery Community Elementary is the largest school in the area with 572 students in PK–5, while St. Cloud Area Learning Center (237 students) and Central Minnesota Virtual Academy (53 students) both serve grades 6–12.
No school here stands out as high-performing on the reported metrics. Discovery Community Elementary has the most complete test data and the strongest math and reading of the three, yet still reports 17.4% math, 20.6% reading, and 7.0% science proficiency — below both the district (24.9%, 31.0%, 14.8%) and the state (44.9%, 48.6%, 25.5%) — with a 6th percentile rank and 0 stars. St. Cloud Area Learning Center reports 3.0% math, 0.0% reading, and 9.1% science, plus a 39.3% graduation rate and a 16.8% dropout rate, far worse than the district's 67.3% and 8.5%. Central Minnesota Virtual Academy has all 2025-2026 test scores suppressed and a blank student-teacher ratio, but reports a striking 7.6% graduation rate alongside a 0.0% dropout rate.
Poverty is high across the area: the weighted average free/reduced lunch rate is about 73.4%, with all three schools above 58%. Data suppression limits comparisons, especially for the virtual academy and for many grade-level scores at the Area Learning Center, so those gaps should be read as unknown rather than as failures. Where data exist, the pattern is consistent — low proficiency, low graduation rates, and results below the district and state averages.
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