Fort Sumner Municipal Schools

Fort Sumner Municipal Schools is a small New Mexico district serving 283 students across three schools — one elementary, one middle, and one high school — covering grades PK through 12, ranked 37th of 87 districts in the state with 3 stars.

Each school serves a different grade band, so comparing them means comparing different age groups. Fort Sumner Elementary is the largest school with 124 students in PK–5 and the highest free/reduced lunch rate at 65.32%, yet still posts results above state averages in both reading and math. Fort Sumner Middle has 70 students in grades 6–8, the smallest enrollment but by far the highest student-teacher ratio at 15.9 (compared with 9.3 at the elementary and 8.3 at the high school). Its strongest results are in 6th- and 7th-grade English language arts, well above state averages, while 8th-grade science falls below the state. Fort Sumner High has 89 students in grades 9–12 and the strongest current position of the three, ranking in the 67th percentile with above-state results in every listed 11th-grade subject, including reading, math, and science.

Across the district, reading and writing scores are a bigger bright spot than math. Districtwide, English language arts is 8.36 points above the state average while math is only 1.67 points above, and math proficiency remains low in absolute terms even where it beats the state — the high school, for example, shows about 21% proficiency in math. One trend worth watching: all three schools dropped from 4 stars to 3 stars in 2025–2026, with the elementary school showing the largest decline. Families should also keep in mind that with such small grade-level cohorts, year-to-year swings can look dramatic without reflecting a real change in school quality.