Summary:
ZIP code 27344 contains exactly one middle school — Chatham Middle — serving grades 6–8 with 513 students in Siler City, NC. Because there is only one middle school in this area, the most useful comparisons are to the surrounding Chatham County Schools district and to North Carolina as a whole.
Chatham Middle is a 1-star school, ranking in the bottom 14–23% of North Carolina middle schools over the last three school years. That is especially striking because its district, Chatham County Schools, is rated 4 stars and sits in the top quarter of districts statewide. The school serves a student body that is almost universally economically disadvantaged: 99.42% of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. Chronic absenteeism is also a concern, with 24.0% of students chronically absent in 2024–25 — above the district’s 21.4% but about average for the state. The student–teacher ratio is a relatively favorable 13.7, but that alone does not offset the academic challenges.
On state End-of-Grade tests, Chatham Middle consistently trails both its district and the state by wide margins. In 2025–26, proficiency rates ranged from about 28% in 8th grade math to 50% in 8th grade science. The gaps versus the district are large: roughly 21 to 29 percentage points across every subject and grade, with the biggest gaps in 7th grade reading (33.3% proficient vs. 62.2% in the district) and 8th grade math (28.5% vs. 57.1%). Year-to-year results are mixed — 8th grade science improved dramatically from 39.3% to 50.3%, while 8th grade math fell sharply from 43.5% to 28.5%. Overall, the school’s only clear bright spot is 8th grade science, yet even that remains well below the state average. For parents, the key takeaway is that Chatham Middle faces significant challenges tied to concentrated poverty and attendance, and its academic performance lags far behind the strong district that surrounds it.
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