Summary:
The Cumberland school group includes eight schools—five elementary, two middle and one high school—serving grades K–12. In 2025–26, the seven elementary and middle schools averaged 50.6% proficiency in ELA, 55.6% in math and 47.1% in science, compared with 33.1%, 31.9% and 31.1% statewide; the group averages were also 3.6 points below the district in both ELA and math, and 0.6 points above it in science. The most important finding is that school results vary substantially, especially among the elementary schools.
Community School leads the elementary group in all three subjects, with 71.9% ELA, 78.7% math and 74.4% science; its results exceed the next-highest elementary school, Ashton School, by 16.2, 16.3 and 25.8 points, respectively. At the other end, B.F. Norton Elementary School is lowest in all three subjects, including math at 26.2%—22.7 points below the next-lowest school, Garvin Memorial. In the middle grades, North Cumberland Middle leads Joseph L. McCourt Middle School by 20.7 to 23.5 points across subjects. SchoolDigger ranked Community first of 163 elementary schools and North Cumberland second of 68 middle schools. At Cumberland High School, grade 11 SAT proficiency was 61% in ELA and 28.5% in math.
Across the seven elementary and middle schools, average proficiency dipped slightly from 2024–25 to 2025–26: 0.8 points in ELA, 0.9 in math and 0.7 in science, though individual schools moved differently. North Cumberland gained 7.0 points in math, and McCourt gained 12.4; Norton fell 11.4 points in math. SchoolDigger’s percentile rankings were steady for Community and North Cumberland from 2023–24 to 2025–26, while McCourt improved from 56 to 79 and Norton declined from 49 to 39. Context figures do not suggest a simple pattern: Community has the highest listed student–teacher ratio among the elementary and middle schools (16.5) and lowest listed free/reduced-lunch rate (8.99%), while high-performing North Cumberland has a ratio of 13.1 and rate of 13.84%. Cumberland High’s 91.1% graduation rate exceeded state and district figures, even as several of its recent test results declined.
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