Waverly High School

Waverly High School is a public high school in Waverly, Ohio, a small community in the Pike County area of southern Ohio, serving grades 9–12 with 435 students as part of the Waverly City district. In 2025–2026 it ranked 650th of 795 Ohio high schools — the 18th percentile, with a 1-star rating — and it has stayed in the bottom quartile for a decade, generally between the 18th and 27th percentile. The Waverly City district ranked 586th of 773, slightly higher than the school. Among nearby traditional high schools, Waverly has the lowest rank; Southeastern High School is the local standout at the 55th percentile with 3 stars.

Two things stand out in Waverly's favor. Its graduation rate is 97.1%, among the highest locally — just behind Southeastern High School (98.7%), Paint Valley High School (98.6%), Western High School (98.3%), and Unioto High School (97.3%). Chronic absenteeism, at 26.4%, is lower than every nearby school with reported data — including Paint Valley High School (28.0%) and Chillicothe High School (39.5%) — and has fallen sharply from 47.5% in 2021–2022, though it remains above the district rate of 21.9%.

Academics are the clearest concern. Waverly scored below the Ohio average on every reported End-of-Course exam: Algebra I 36.8% (state 61.6%), Geometry 30.4% (state 43.3%), Biology 45.5% (state 67.0%), English II 54.8% (state 62.7%), American Government 60.7% (state 71.6%), and American History 66.2% (state 73.2%). Algebra I is also far below the district's 56.4%, suggesting a high-school-level instructional gap. No student subgroup reached the 30th percentile — low-income students were at the 24th, gifted students at the 28th, and special education students at the 10th. Waverly's reported per-student spending of $8,220 (2018–2019) was the lowest among nearby schools. There are signs of improvement: Biology rose from 8.3% to 45.5% and Geometry from 12.6% to 30.4%.