Best Public Schools in Zip Code 39051

Zip code 39051 (Carthage, MS) contains five schools serving 2,061 students: three elementary schools, one middle school, and one high school, with nearly every student (about 99%) qualifying for free/reduced lunch. All three Leake County schools—Leake Central Elementary School, Leake Central Junior High School, and Leake Central High School—belong to the Leake County School District, which ranks 114th out of 134 Mississippi districts (15th percentile, 1 star). Standing Pine Elementary School and Red Water Elementary School are listed under their own districts and have no ranking or test-score data available.

Leake Central Junior High School is the relative standout, ranking 209th of 260 Mississippi middle schools (20th percentile) and earning 2 stars in 2023–2024. It posted 100% proficiency in Algebra I End-of-Course in 2024–2025, though this likely reflects a small accelerated cohort. Leake Central High School is the biggest concern: its 79.0% graduation rate trails the state's 89.2%, its chronic absenteeism is 35.7%, and only 29.2% of students passed Biology. Standing Pine Elementary School (7.6:1 student-teacher ratio) and Red Water Elementary School (5.8:1) offer much smaller class sizes than the Leake County schools, but without test data their academic performance cannot be evaluated.

Attendance worsens sharply with age: chronic absenteeism rises from 14.8% at Leake Central Elementary School (better than the state's 23.9%) to 20.4% at the junior high and 35.7% at the high school. Math is a systemic weakness—4th grade math proficiency is 16.3% versus 51.5% statewide, 6th grade math is 27.2% versus 52.7%, and Algebra I is 37.5% versus 66.0%. Science gaps also widen by high school, with Biology at 29.2% versus 63.1% statewide. Meanwhile, Leake Central Elementary School showed volatile year-to-year swings; its strongest subject is 5th grade science (59.0% versus 71.5% statewide). The bottom line: 39051 is a high-poverty, low-performing cluster, with the middle school as the positive outlier and the high school facing the most serious attendance and graduation challenges.