NCS Digital

NCS Digital is a small alternative public school in Newark, Ohio, serving 249 students in grades 2 through 12 as part of Newark City Schools, a district that ranks in the bottom third of Ohio schools. Alternative programs serve students who transferred out of traditional high schools, are behind on credits, or need a flexible schedule, so district and state averages are not a like-for-like comparison. No other schools were listed within 20 miles, making the district and the state the only benchmarks available.

On the 2025–26 state tests, NCS Digital averaged 39.2% proficient across eleven assessments, compared with 52.1% for the district and 60.2% for the state. The gap is not general: reading, history, and science sit close to district norms, while math lags badly. Seventh-grade ELA (58.3%) actually beats the district by 6.2 points, and American History (60.7%) and Biology (55.6%) are within about three points of it. Math is the opposite story — Geometry at 7.1% and eighth-grade Math at 8.3% are both more than 36 points below the state. Grade sizes here are tiny, so a single subject can swing 25 points or more from year to year; the overall average is the more trustworthy number.

Attendance is the school's strongest improvement. Chronic absenteeism fell from 57.9% in 2022–23 to 34.0% in 2025–26, closing most of the gap with the district. Graduation rose from 47.8% to 63.2% in the same year, and the student-teacher ratio dropped from 29.5 to 17.1, while Algebra I proficiency jumped from a stable 26–28% range to 50% — promising, though one year is not yet a trend. Two data gaps matter: free/reduced-price lunch figures have been withheld by the state, and the only spending figure reported is from 2018–19. The bottom line for parents: this school appears to be turning around how it keeps students in class and supported, but math instruction remains its biggest unresolved challenge.