Central High

The Central High area has three schools serving prekindergarten through grade 12: Central High Elementary School (198 students, pre-K–5), Central High Middle School (103 students, grades 6–8), and Central High High School (113 students, grades 9–12). The elementary school is the clearest academic bright spot, while the middle and high schools trail state results in the shared all-grade subjects. In 2025–2026, elementary students were 26% proficient in math and 44% in science, compared with state results of 25% and 30%; middle and high school math results were 9% and 4%, and science results were 21% and 12%. The central takeaway is that academic results differ sharply across the grade levels, with the elementary school standing out most in math and science.

Central High Elementary School led in math and science: its all-grade results were 17 points above the middle school and 22 points above the high school in math, and 23 and 32 points higher, respectively, in science. In ELA, Central High High School had the highest result, at 19%, versus 14% at the elementary school and 11% at the middle school, though all three were below the state’s 26%. The high school’s math result, 4%, was the lowest of the three and 21 points below the state. Because the schools serve different grade spans, all-grade comparisons are broad rather than same-grade comparisons.

Results changed in different directions over time: elementary science rose from 35% to 44% and math from 23% to 26%, while elementary ELA fell from 22% to 14%. High-school ELA improved from 14% to 19%, but math dropped from 11% to 4%; middle-school ELA fell from 20% to 11%. SchoolDigger’s 2025–2026 rankings were 37th percentile (2 stars) for the elementary school, 12th (1 star) for the middle school, and 11th (1 star) for the high school; compared with the earliest available rankings, the elementary and high school were down 28 and 38 percentile points. Student-teacher ratios were similar, at 13.8 at the elementary school and 13.6 at each older school. In 2024–2025, free/reduced lunch eligible shares were 57% at the elementary school, 41% at the middle school, and 38% at the high school. These context measures describe the schools but do not explain their differing results.