Mt. Olive Attendance Center

Mt. Olive Attendance Center is a small, rural K-12 school in Mount Olive, Mississippi, serving 282 students in the Covington County School District. The school serves an extremely high-need population — nearly all students (98.9%) qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a rate far higher than nearby Mize Attendance Center (62.7%) or Taylorsville Attendance Center (88.6%).

One of the most striking differences between Mt. Olive and its neighbors is chronic absenteeism. In 2023-24, 38.7% of Mt. Olive students were chronically absent — more than three times the rate at Taylorsville (12.5%) and more than double the rate at Mize (16.0%). Despite this challenge, the school's graduation rate of 85.3% in 2024-25 outpaces its district's 82.3% and is close to Mize's 86.2%, though below the state average of 89.2%. Mt. Olive also maintains a very low student-teacher ratio of 8.1, compared to 12.2 at Taylorsville and 14.6 at Mize, which means smaller class sizes and more potential for individualized attention.

Academically, Mt. Olive shows a mixed picture. It outperforms Taylorsville in most tested subjects — average grades 3-8 ELA proficiency was 32.3% versus 22.6%, and math was 40.0% versus 32.7%. However, both schools trail Mize significantly, where ELA proficiency was 51.3% and math was 68.0%. Mt. Olive's strengths are most visible in upper-grade math and end-of-course exams: Algebra I proficiency reached 61.9% in 2024-25, U.S. History hit 85.7%, and 7th grade math reached 76.9% in 2025-26. The biggest concerns are early elementary literacy and numeracy — 3rd grade math proficiency was just 13.6% in 2024-25. Given the small student body, proficiency rates can swing sharply from year to year, so it's best to look at multi-year trends. Overall, Mt. Olive is a high-poverty school with real pockets of strength and clear opportunities for growth — particularly in reducing absenteeism and building stronger early-grade foundations.