Cortland City School District

The Cortland City School District consists of 5 schools, including 2 elementary schools, 2 middle schools, and 1 high school, serving students in the Cortland area. The district's performance is mixed, with Cortland High School standing out as the strongest performer, while the middle schools struggle with proficiency on state assessments.

Cortland High School is the district's top performer, ranking in the top 50% of New York high schools in the last 3 years and earning a 3-star rating from SchoolDigger. The school has strong performance on Regents exams, with over 80% proficiency in several subjects, and a relatively low dropout rate of 4.5% and an 84.3% four-year graduation rate. In contrast, the district's middle schools, Cortland Junior High School and Randall Middle School, struggle with proficiency rates on the 3rd-8th grade NY State Assessments, often scoring 10-20 percentage points below the state averages.

The district as a whole faces challenges, with high rates of free and reduced-price lunch recipients across the schools, ranging from 44.93% at Cortland High School to 66.16% at Randall Middle School. Despite the relatively high per-student spending and low student-teacher ratios, the district's academic performance is underperforming compared to the state, suggesting a need to examine instructional practices and support systems to improve student outcomes, particularly at the middle school level.