Summary:
Zip code 28314 in Fayetteville, North Carolina is home to two public middle schools — Lewis Chapel Middle and Anne Chesnutt Middle — both serving grades 6 through 8 within the Cumberland County Schools district and enrolling a combined total of more than 1,000 students in a high-poverty area.
Anne Chesnutt Middle is clearly the stronger-performing school. It ranked in the 44th percentile statewide for 2025–2026, compared with the 21st percentile for Lewis Chapel Middle, and it has improved steadily over three years, moving from the 31st to the 36th to the 44th percentile. Lewis Chapel Middle, by contrast, has remained stuck in the bottom quarter of North Carolina middle schools, with rankings of 15th, 23rd, and 21st. Anne Chesnutt also posts higher average EOG proficiency (53.5% versus 42.7%) and outperforms Lewis Chapel in six of the seven tested grade and subject combinations. Since both schools serve similarly high-poverty populations — free and reduced lunch rates are 99.4% at Anne Chesnutt and 96.5% at Lewis Chapel — poverty alone does not explain the gap.
The most striking difference is chronic absenteeism. At Lewis Chapel Middle, 53.4% of students are chronically absent, which is more than double the district rate of 33.7% and the state rate of 24.2%. At Anne Chesnutt Middle, the rate is 24.3%, essentially matching the state average. Attendance is likely a major driver of the achievement gap. The two schools have comparable resources, including student-teacher ratios of 14.2 versus 13.7 and per-student spending of $9,499 versus $10,211, so improving attendance appears to be the most urgent focus for Lewis Chapel. Its 7th grade math proficiency (33.3%) sits far below the state average of 56.2%, and its earlier edge over Anne Chesnutt in 8th grade science disappeared after Anne Chesnutt surged from 50.7% to 71.3% proficiency. Overall, Anne Chesnutt Middle is the stronger and more improving option, while Lewis Chapel Middle faces serious challenges closely tied to attendance.
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