Howard Learning Academy

Howard Learning Academy is an extremely small, specialized middle school in Fayetteville, NC, serving just 8 students in grades 5–8 as part of Cumberland County Schools. The school has earned 0 stars in every year of available data and has ranked at or near the very bottom of North Carolina's school rankings — 777th out of 778 schools in 2025–2026 — placing it far below every comparable middle school in the area, which typically earn between 1 and 4 stars. Nearby traditional middle schools are much larger, with enrollments ranging from 238 to over 1,000 students.

Academically, Howard's proficiency rates are dramatically lower than nearby schools. In 8th-grade reading, just 7.8% of Howard students were proficient, compared with 52.4% across the district and 56.1% statewide; even the lowest-performing nearby school, Lewis Chapel Middle, posted a proficiency rate about 30 percentage points higher. Chronic absenteeism is also extreme, with 70.5% of Howard's students chronically absent in 2024–25 — roughly double the district rate and nearly triple the state rate. Among nearby schools, chronic absenteeism ranges from 13.1% at Seventy-First Classical Middle to 58.3% at Luther Nick Jeralds Middle.

Despite very low academic outcomes, Howard receives substantial resources: a student–teacher ratio of 0.5 and per-pupil spending of $28,798, roughly triple the spending at nearby schools like Douglas Byrd Middle at $10,730. Subgroup effectiveness rankings for female, male, low-income, and disabled students have all been at or near the 1st percentile in recent years. This pattern — very high staffing and funding, extremely low proficiency, and persistent absenteeism — suggests Howard serves students with profound needs in a specialized alternative setting, but the data show little evidence of academic improvement over time. Neighboring schools like John R Griffin Middle and Seventy-First Classical Middle, both within six miles, demonstrate much stronger outcomes within the same district.